Beneath the Surface
by Chaos Dragon
Summary: Danny's world is shattered when tragedy strikes, but things aren't as they seem. When he turns to a new friend for solace, Danny has to question everything that's happened since Sam's death. Including if she really is dead. DxS
1. Chapter 1

Beneath the Surface

1

_Slender hands tipped in claw like nails snapped the lock on a suitcase, and opened it. Glass vials were stored inside, neatly nestled into the lined case. Dozens of them, each filled with different materials. This one with burnished red dragon scales, that one with a half dozen raven feathers. This one with strands of naiad hair, that one with hind blood. This one with a small golden glow that darted against the confines, a tiny desperate faerie._

_That one with bright green blood from a halfa._

"_This," the creature said with a decided smugness as she ran one finger over the green tinged vial, "Is going to be far too easy."_

xXx

"You know, Danny," I never thought you'd make it through two days, much less two years," Jazz Fenton said to her brother as they weaved through traffic toward their parents' house.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," he mumbled from the passenger seat.

Danny Fenton sat with his head tilted back, eyes closed and trying desperately not to break out in snores as he dozed next to his sister. It was the first day of summer break, and he had eleven weeks of blessed rest and freedom. Relatively, of course, because he could never just ignore the increasing ghost population in the human world. But compared to school, a job, his _second_ job, and the stresses of keeping his various long distance relationships happy and healthy…

Well, he needed more sleep.

It would have been easier, he thought as Jazz turned down their street, if he'd gone to Sam or Tucker's colleges. Sam had gone to the University of New York to study political science and Tucker had gone to MIT to further his obsession with anything technology related. Danny had gone to U.C. Davis in northern California, a continent away from his best friends, and most of one from his family, and he could honestly say that he was glad to finally be coming home for more than a ghost on the fly.

He'd made it for Christmas both years running, had missed a thanksgiving, and managed to surprise his mom on her birthday (though he still hadn't told her he'd made the cross country trip courtesy of Air Phantom), but other than that he'd spent most of the last two years in California at school. He hadn't even seen Tucker since Christmas, or Sam since the summer before when she managed to steal a week in Sacramento without her parents.

But it was worth it. When he went back to school in the fall he'd be thirteen credits shy of graduation and acceptance into the graduate program. Which was something, considering that he'd decided to major in veterinary medicine. Two years of full course loads and summer semesters after high school and his first year had given him a the chance to start the graduate program after Christmas.

It was even more cool because he had a minor in paranormal sciences that was already done, diploma'd and in his carry on with his laptop.

"It's just surprising, Danny," she said as she pulled into the drive and turned the car off. "You'd even got a diploma before Sam and Tucker. It's weird." She slid out of the car, slamming the door closed and glancing up at the one echoed to her from across it. "It makes me want to say 'who are you and what have you done with my brother?'"

"That's me," Danny joked as he tugged his bags from the backseat, slinging two duffel's across his shoulders and hoisting two suitcases. "Danny Fenton, pod person."

The front door swung open before they got to it and Danny was tackled by two slender arms wrapping around his neck. "Oh my god, Danny, I can't believe you're actually here," Sam Manson was shrieking in his ear as he dropped his suitcases and wrapped one arm around her, the other grabbing for the railing to keep them from falling back down the stairs.

"You got small," he said as he held her tightly against him, his face buried in her hair. "And your hair got long," he laughed as he pulled back and she swung the thick tail back across her shoulders.

"Gimme," she said and snatched a suitcase up before he could grab both of them again. "Tucker! Come do something for a change."

"Danny, man, it's good to see you," Tucker Foley said as he appeared in the doorway and ducked past Sam and Jazz to grab the other suitcase and unhook two of the duffel's from around Danny's neck so that all he was carrying was the bag with his laptop and diploma. Among other things, though eh didn't want to have to think of the tricks he'd pulled to get the ectoguns through security.

"I'm alive and kicking, see?" he said as they all dragged the bags in and dumped them by the stairs. He'd take them up through the ceiling when someone distracted his parents. It was easier than trying to carry them all up at once. "When did you guys get in?"

"Jazz was back last week," Sam said as she dropped down on the couch. "Tucker got back yesterday, I flew in last night." She made a face. "Midnight arrivals suck. And what did you bring home? Slabs of granite?"

Danny stuck his tongue out at her. "No, just a couple trees. You remember the redwoods?"

"That's not funny, those trees are endangered," Sam said and poked him in the side as Tucker collapsed next to her and then on top of her. "Off," she said as she tugged his signature red beret down over his face.

"I brought home stuff. Books, clothes, presents."

"Presents?" Jazz asked eagerly as she leaned over the back of the couch, her hair dangling in Danny's face. "Where's mine?"

Tucker snickered as he straightened his beret and sat up. "Did you bring someone some jewelry finally? You know, of the diamond ring persuasion?"

"Tucker," Danny said warningly, finding himself echoed by Sam as he flushed red. "Where's Mom and Dad? I wanted to give them theirs first."

"They are at the store getting last minute supplies," Sam said.

"Dad wanted cookies."

"Oh," Danny said, and smiled. Quickly he went into ghost mode and shot up off the couch. "I'm going to put my stuff in my room," he said as he grabbed his bags, turning them and himself intangible and flying through the ceiling and into his room. He dropped them at the foot of his bed, save for one of the duffel's, and let himself drift back down to relax across the couch, head on the arm and legs draped across Sam before he became human again.

"So," he said, hand on the bag, "Who wants goodies?"

"Goodies?" Danny's mom said from behind him and he spun around, accidentally kicking Sam in the arm as he went pale and saw her head peeking from around the kitchen door.

"M-Mom!" he stuttered. "How long have you been there?"

"Not long, sweetie," she said and smiled at him. He jumped over the couch and wrapped her in a hug. "I missed you, Danny. It's good to have you home."

"Alright, let me at him," his dad said, following his wife through into the living room. "C'mere," he said and he scooped both of them up in a hug. "Imagine, my Danny has a degree in ghosts!"

"Um, paranormal science, Dad," Danny said as he extracted himself and hopped back over the couch. "It's a lot more than just ghosts," he said with a grin at his friends.

He grabbed his computer bag as his parents settled on the couch across from him and dug through, coming up with a black (fake) leather case that he handed to his mother. "I figured it was the best thing I could bring home to you," he said as she opened it and smiled.

"It's wonderful, Danny," she said. "We'll have to frame it and put it up with Jazz's Masters Degree."

Danny grinned. "That's great. But it wasn't the only thing I brought. Just the best," and he grabbed the duffel from next to his feet and unzipped it, pulling out two boxes from the top. They were wrapped, and Sam cracked up at how bad a job he'd actually done on the. "Hey, wrapping is not my strong point. Why do you think I always get Jazz to do it?"

He tossed one box to his mom, the other to his dad, and watched as they opened them. His mother's was a small book that she obviously had recognized easily. "Danny, this is amazing! I've never seen one of these outside of a museum."

"It's the only one," he said with a smug smile as she leafed through a handwritten copy of Caspian's Annotated Paranormal Anthology, with a few additions straight from the ghost zone. "There're some pages I stuck in the back," he said as she flipped to them. "Some of the things I found out, I thought they might be useful to you."

His father, however, was staring at a mall glass jar filled with green goo.

"It's ectoplasm from the most powerful ghost in the Ghost Zone," Danny said, and winked at the dropped jaws Sam and Tucker gave him. He'd tell them later how he convinced Clockwork to part with a bit of ectoplasm. Until then, they could gape.

He dug another gift out, this time a simple envelope, and handed it to Jazz. The only response he got was a squeal as she opened the envelope and found tickets to the American Psychology Convention in Washington state that fall.

Two more gifts later, and the bag was empty, a massive flat box on Tucker's lap and a small cube in Sam's hand. They both gave him looks, asking whether or not it was safe, and Danny shrugged as they began to unwrap them. Tucker immediately started spluttering and covering his box with scraps of paper before popping up and heading for the stairs at speed.

Sam shot Danny a questioning glance and said, "Do I want to know?"

"Probably not," he said honestly, and got up and gave his parents another hug, a kiss on his mom's cheek and then followed Tucker up the stairs and into his room, absently kicking at a suitcase so that he could collapse on the bed. "Tired," he said pitifully as Sam dropped to the foot of the bed in a more lady like fashion.

"I'm going to kill you, Danny," Tucker said as Sam snatched the box from his lap and started laughing at it. On the front was a rather… graphic, Danny thought was the best word, depiction of a blow up doll. His ode to Tucker and his forever dating ways.

"I'm already half dead, so it's not going to happen. Why don't you actually open the box instead of being pissed about what you think it is?" Danny suggested as he cracked one eye open to make sure his best friend actually did that instead of being too shy.

"If it's really a blow up doll, I'm going to have to wash my eyes with bleach," Sam said as she sat forward, watching avidly, her own gift forgotten in her hands as she tried to see what Tucker was doing.

Tape was snapped, cardboard ripped a little, and the lid came off to reveal wads of white tissue paper that Tucker shuffled through hurriedly. "What is it, Danny? Where is it?" he begged as he finally swooshed the last layer of paper to the floor to reveal a book. "A book?"

Danny rolled his eyes. "No, not a book. A grimoire, from England. Somebody said that it was Merlin's," he added with a snicker.

"And we all know how real he was," Sam muttered as she plucked the book from Tucker's hands. "I'm willing to bet you, though," she said as she opened the thick book and traced a finger along a page, "that this is real. I can feel the power."

Danny shrugged. "It's covered in the stuff, just like the two of you are."

Sam shot Danny a grin at that. "Well, we had to do something so we weren't just sidekicks."

Danny laughed as Sam and Tucker paged through the thick handwritten book, arguing over translations and sometimes insulting the original owner's handwriting. In the five years since Danny had gained his ghost powers, Sam and Tucker had invested themselves as his sidekicks, and then ghost fighting equals by studying, of all things, magic.

Sam had reasoned that if ghosts existed, and magical objects (like the Reality Gauntlet) existed, then there was a pretty good chance that magic existed. So after enough research to keep the three of them plowed under by school work and ghost fighting combined, they managed to find out that there were two types of magic users. Those with the innate ability, and those who learned it through study and practice.

They'd both fallen under the second, until Sam had found a highly dangerous spell at the end of the junior year that required a human sacrifice to trigger latent innate ability. And they'd performed it, with Danny as the sacrifice, in a completely, insanely roundabout way. Sam and Tucker convinced him that if they drew blood from him in his human form, and then he went ghost, that the spells requirements of blood from a living creature that became a ghost would be satisfied.

It had been, and they'd spent a great deal of time and effort in the intervening time becoming fairly decent mages. Sam insisted on that, she wasn't going to let herself be called a witch. Not when she'd spent most of high school calling Paulina one. And Tucker had agreed that it was acceptable, since when he thought of wizards he pictured fruity old men with long gray beards and tall, pointy hats.

"I take it you like?" Danny asked as Tucker nodded enthusiastically.

"Dude, do I even want to know how you got your hands on this?"

"Probably not," Danny muttered as he winced in remembered agony. He'd had to donate a pound of flesh for the cause, and even in ghost form the pieces taken made him ache to remember it. "But it was worth it if half the things I was told are true."

"Probably more than you'd think," Sam said as she handed Tucker the grimoire back.

Sitting up, Danny picked up the small box Sam had forgotten on the bed. "So, are you going to open yours?" he asked as he handed it to her, steeling himself against the familiar jolt of desire as she took it from him, her fingers brushing his and making an all too familiar heat rush across his face.

"Yeah," she said quickly, too quickly. She fiddled with the paper before working a finger beneath the tape and popping it loose. "I don't suppose you'll tell me what it is?" she asked as she tugged the paper off and crumpled it into a ball that she aimed at Tucker's head.

"Hey!" he yelped indignantly as it bounced off his forehead and he looked up to glare at her. Then his mouth hung open and he stared at the box is Sam's hand. "I know I asked if you brought her jewelry, but I was joking. I think."

Sam turned bright red as she stared down at the simple black velvet box in her hand. "It's not, is it?" she asked.

Danny shifted uncomfortably on the bed and shook his head. "No. It's not," he said with a pained smile at her tone. That was the reason why it wasn't, because she'd never given him even the slightest indication that she might be interested… "I'm not proposing, so you don't have to worry. Besides, the box is just ridiculously big for a ring."

"Yeah," Tucker said as he closed his book. "Cause if you're proposing I want to know when you two had the time to date."

Sam shook her head and tried to slow the beating of her heart as she opened the box and gasped. Inside the box was a smooth sphere of clear amber, perhaps an inch, maybe more in diameter. She lifted it out carefully and held it up to the let the sunlight filter through it, smiling even wider when she realized that it was, unlike most amber when cut larger than a carat, completely flawless.

"It's amazing, Danny. How'd you find it?" she asked as she cradled in her palm, shooting him a radiant smile.

He grinned back, his blue eyes bright in the face of her pleasure. "Let's just say I know someone. Test it out?" he asked with a cocked eyebrow. "I've been gone a while. You can both show me a few tricks."

Sam laughed and tossed the amber globe into the air and raised her hand so that it was caught in a net of energy she wrapped around it. The stone drifted higher and suddenly began to glow, and then Tucker laughed and said something quietly, and the stone burst apart into thousands of incandescent particles, drifting down over them all and disappearing when they fell on Danny's skin.

And when he looked back at Sam, she was holding the stone up in her fingers like nothing had ever happened, smiling smugly with Tucker as he nodded, impressed. "Alright, I'll admit it. That was wicked cool."

"Mostly illusion," Tucker said as he leaned back in the chair, twisting around and booting Danny's desktop up.

"You guys can do more than illusions, right?" Danny asked.

Sam laughed. "Well, duh. But most of our magic is, um, aggressive?" She laughed again, this time lacing it with a distinctly evil edge. "Of course, I can show you a glamour, if you want."

"Um, I don't think—" Danny started before scrabbling back across the bed from the vapid Paulina that was sitting at the foot of his bed and staring at him like he was the only popsicle around on a very hot day. "Get away from me!" he yelped.

Tucker laughed as he swiveled back around. "Sam, that's not very nice."

The glamour dissolved and Sam collapsed across the bed laughing. "I know it's not, but you have to admit, it was funny."

"I hate you both," Danny muttered as the shot grins his way.

xXx

"So when does your roommate get in?" Tucker asked as the three friends strolled through the park.

The sun had set more than an hour ago and Danny had already taken up his role as ghostly defender of Amity Park. From the Box Ghost, which had been a pitifully simple task, and had finally cemented in him the fact that he was home. He was currently heading through the park with Sam and Tucker on their way back from the Nasty Burger.

"Hmm?" Danny asked, distracted. He was still trying to get over the fact that Dash Baxter, golden boy of Casper High's athletics program, was flipping burgers for a living. "Oh, Charlie gets in tomorrow morning. I have to be at the airport before eight."

"Jazz is actually letting you borrow her car?" Sam asked as she trialed behind the two boys, her attention on the amber sphere still.

"It was either that or take the RV. Jazz bit the bullet and I get to pick Charlie up like a normal person."

"Oh, yeah. And your appearance of normal is going to dissolve the second you get home," Tucker said as he glanced back behind him at Sam. "Will you quit that?"

"What?" she asked defensively, and the amber was dropped quickly into a pocket before Tucker could reply. "Sorry," she muttered. "It's just cool."

"And I'm missing something," Danny said as he watched, bemused.

"I was using the amber as a focus for the ley lines in the park," Sam said as she shrugged. "Tucker's a bit sensitive to them since the incident last year."

"Incident?" Danny asked.

Tucker shook his head. "Nothing really. Just got snapped by one, is all. Makes me jumpy when people play with them around me."

Danny started to ask for Tucker to explain it to him in English when blue mist escaped his lips. "Right, ghost," he said, and Sam tugged the amber back out.

"Let me," she said with confidence. "I want to try this out for real."

Danny shrugged. "You know where I am. Just scream if you need me," he said as he watched her run back behind them and disappear behind some bushes. "Well, she seems to know what she's doing."

"We both do, Danny," Tucker said as he snagged a seat on a bench to wait for Sam to come back. "Sorry about the ring thing. You know, with the box."

Danny sighed and sank down next to him. "Don't worry about it. It's no big deal."

"It is. I don't know why you're still dancing around it after all these years."

"Dancing around what?" Danny asked. "We're friends."

"Which is why Sam willingly went to a debutante ball after she snuck off to visit you last summer. Because you're just friends," Tucker said, annoyed. "You're crazy about her. I know you are, so don't deny it."

"Alright. I won't," Danny said, amused that he could at least wipe the annoyance from Tucker's face with the unexpected admission. "I'm crazy about her. Doesn't mean she feels the same way."

"Oh my god. I can't believe I'm saying this. It's painful enough to agree with her without echoing her, but you are such a male," Tucker said. "Do you really think that Sam doesn't feel the same way?"

"She made it pretty clear earlier," Danny said, and Tucker winced a little at that. He could certainly understand how Danny would take Sam's reaction to Tucker's jabs about diamond rings and then the black jewelry box as not being interested.

But Tucker knew it wasn't true, otherwise he wouldn't be fielding calls all year long from Sam asking if Tucker had heard from him recently, or what do you think he'd like for Christmas, or even the loudly squealed oh my god he's coming home for the summer call. That one still made his ears hurt.

Danny grunted. "You talk like you're not a guy yourself," Danny muttered.

"I talk like a guy who's been talking to two women nonstop for three straight semesters," Tucker corrected.

"Well, I know Sam's one. Who's the other?"

"Miranda," Tucker said with a grin.

"Miranda?" Danny asked.

"My almost significant other. But you're trying to change the subject, so don't," Tucker answered with a verbal parry.

"What's the subject?" Sam asked as she popped up behind them, making both of them jump to their feet startled. She raised an eyebrow as she looked back and forth at them, her blue eyed halfa holding a fistful of ectoenergy and Tucker reflecting a similar green glow out of his eyes as his own hands blazed in shades of red.

"You two are way too jumpy," she said. "Ghost is gone. I like the stone," she shot at Danny as she headed around the bench and between them, heading down the path and towards the park's exit. "Are you two coming?"

Danny glanced at Tucker with a surprised stare as he took in the quick reactions and impressive display, and let his own hands dim and release the ectoenergy he'd been ready to send pulsing at Sam before they realized it was her. "She might have a point," he said as he rubbed the back of his neck and turned to follow her.

"Sam always has a point," Tucker said as they caught up to her.

"That I do," she said as she looped her arms through theirs. "So, what time are we leaving tomorrow?"

"Leaving?" Danny asked.

"You have a roommate to pick up, right? Tuck and I are going with, of course. You know, full Amity Park welcome and all that. Huh. Maybe a full Team Phantom welcome would be more appropriate."

"Jazz isn't going," Danny said automatically. "You guys want to go with me?"

"Wouldn't have asked if we didn't," Sam grinned.

Tucker sighed. "Actually, I never asked. That was all you, Sam."

"And where I go, you go."

Danny laughed. "Be at my house at seven."

"Seven?" Sam asked, dismayed. "But that's so early."

"Hey," Tucker interjected. "You wanted to go. So seven it is."


	2. Chapter 2

Beneath the Surface

2

_The plan was coming along smoothly, she decided as she moved with the rank and file of humans. In a few more weeks she would be able to begin the implementation and separate the halfa from his friends. Especially the human female he was so enamored with. She was the only faltering point of the carefully laid strategy._

_But, the creature decided as the humans moved forward, that was where the plan became something more than simply intelligent. It bordered on true genius._

_Too many from outside the mortal realm had tried to eliminate the halfa's friends, and all had failed. But she was a firm believer that it was because the boy could combat these obvious tactics. Whereas her plan was from within._

_After all, sabotage was rarely discovered before at least some damage had been done. And the creature was determined that the damage would be thorough._

xXx

"Whoever decided that planes should arrive before noon needs to be shot," Danny muttered as he sped around a slower moving car on his way to the airport. From behind him he heard a panicked sound from Tucker, and Sam was next to him holding on to the dashboard for dear life.

"Maybe if you hadn't overslept we wouldn't be running late?" Sam offered as Danny pressed harder on the accelerator.

Tucker grunted as Danny hit the breaks and made a hard right into the airport parking lot, and then winced when the seatbelt locked as he was thrown into it. "How the hell did you get your license, Danny?"

There was no answer and Sam glanced over at Danny's intense expression. You do have a license, right?" she asked as her fingers gripped the vinyl of the car a little more tightly.

"Oh my god," Tucker moaned. "We're going to die. There's a madman at the wheel without a license."

The car swerved into an empty space and Danny slammed it into park, yanking on the emergency break as he tried to laugh and glare at the same time. "I have a license. I do, I just don't drive much."

"Right," Sam said as she exited the car with all haste, Tucker not far behind. "Because your driving is like your flying: death defying."

"I was going with reckless," Tucker corrected as they followed Danny into the airport.

He stopped in front of the overhead listings for departures and arrivals. He scanned them and after a minute found the flight from Sacramento scheduled to arrive at eight, and found a blinking notice next to it that read 'delayed.' He let out a whoop of relief and raced for the gate, since it was listed as only running twenty minutes late and he was running a little more.

By the time he got there, Sam and Tucker were panting beside him and he was scanning the people who were just beginning to head down the ramp from the plane, looking for his roommate. "You," Sam panted, "got really fit."

Danny laughed. "At least you know I could pass that stupid fitness test now," he said and glanced at Tucker. "I take it you two don't get much exercise?"

"We get enough," Sam said. "But I'd swear you could do a four minute mile."

"Three minutes, fifty seconds," he said absently as he kept scanning the crowd. "I don't see her anywhere."

_Her?_ Sam thought in alarm and glanced at Danny. Her? Danny was rooming with a girl? She felt herself go a little more pale than normal, and then Danny was moving forward to a very petite girl in a lavender skirt and white tank top.

Her eyes narrowed even more as the girl's eyes widened and she broke into a blindingly white smile as she saw Danny, her arms stretching out to wrap around his neck as he spun her around. Sam's hands clenched into fists and she had to make a conscious effort to loosen them before she drew blood with her nails.

Besides, if she was going to draw blood from anyone, it would be this _female_, and her mind hissed the word, who was all over Danny. Tiny with a short blond bob and brilliantly blue eyes. Just the kind of girl Sam had always disliked.

A more rational part of her brain was saying that Danny wasn't acting very intimate with the girl. He wasn't holding her hand, doing more than giving her an enthusiastic hug. A very enthusiastic hug. Sure he was offering to carry her carry on, but Danny was a gentleman. And why did it matter if this girl, this Charlie, was making eyes at her Danny.

He was hers. He'd been hers for years already.

He just didn't know it yet.

"Uh, Sam," Tucker said quietly as Danny led the girl towards them. "You might want to tone down the kill lights in your eyes."

She clenched her teeth and shot a look at Tucker, but made the effort, and by the time Danny was presenting Charlie to them Sam was forcing herself to smile as pleasantly as she knew how. Which was fairly present considering she was still pretty goth. But it was something, and she'd make sure that Danny knew the things she went through for him, so help her.

"Tucker, Sam, this is Charlie Mackenzie," Danny said with a grin.

"Ah, nice to meet you Charlie," Tucker said. "We were kind of expecting a guy," he added hesitantly, "Since you were rooming with Danny and all."

Charlie laughed, a delicate thing that set Sam's nerves on end. "We have that talk a lot," she said. "I'm registered as 'Charlie,' and by the time the mistake was realized there simply weren't any available room sin a female dorm."

"And they were cool with a coed set up?" Sam asked. "I'm Sam."

Danny shrugged. "The dean figured it was safe enough, since I was barely there. the dorm we're in is actually coed, just same sex roommates." They began walking to the luggage carousels as he explained. "Since I wasn't there a lot in the first place, it was alright. Especially since it's actually not one room."

Sam shrugged it off. She'd seen the set up Danny had; a tiny kitchen area and general space between the two tiny rooms. But he's seemed happy with it. Of course, that was probably because he didn't have his mom all over his case to clean his room all the time. Her eye twitched. The thought of that female keeping Danny's space cleaned was cropping up in her mind, and she was ready to throttle it.

"God, Danny, I've never seen anyone as busy as you were this past year. Especially the spring semester," Charlie said as the luggage pickup came into view. "Between his job and regular classes, he was already swamped. But he was finishing his minor during second semester and had to get a thesis paper together," she explained. "I'd go days without seeing him."

"But you knew I was alive. I stole your soda," Danny said as he spotted an apparently familiar suitcase and snagged it from the moving conveyor. "You brought both, right?"

She nodded agreement. "Does he drink soda at home?" she asked Sam.

Sam arched an eyebrow. "Not since our junior year of high school. it was forbidden."

"Sam," Danny said as he grabbed another suitcase and shoved it at Tucker.

"Aw, come on, Danny," Tucker said as they began the hike back out to the parking lot. "Just because you don't want Charlie to know about the pixie stix incident."

"Tucker!"

Sam laughed. "Lancer never looked at you the same way, you know that?"

"I remember," Danny said as he flushed bright red. "I, uh, mixed a couple dozen pixie stix with a can of soda in my mouth," he said to Charlie. "Let's just say that the result was volcanic, and the vice principal was ground zero."

"Oh," Charlie said, and then started laughing. "Oh, I get it. That's horrible. You drive a pink Beetle?" she asked in surprise as Danny stopped next to his sister's car and fished out the keys to open it up.

"Only when my sister lets me borrow it," he said as he and Tucker shoved the two suitcases in the trunk space.

"Believe me, it's better than his parents' car," Tucker added as he slid into the backseat. Sam followed Tucker silently, and Charlie grabbed shot gun without a word as Danny cranked the car.

"Everyone buckled in?" he asked with a glance before backing out and shifting into drive, taking the exit much more sedately than he had entered.

"Don't you have a car, Danny?" Charlie asked as she watched the passing scenery.

He shook his head and Tucker chimed in from the back. "Danny uses alternative methods to get around."

Danny's eyes shot up to the rearview and pinned tucker with a steely glare. "Amity's a fairly small town. I'm used to walking wherever I go, or using," and he smiled back at Sam quickly, "environmentally friendly electric scooters."

"That's so considerate," Charlie said, and the smile Sam had shared with Danny died a miserable death by frown. "Are you environmentalist?"

"Nope. That's Sam. I'm more of a… What'd you call me last time I refused to go to one of your protests?" he asked, amused.

"I called you a tree killing, environmentally unsafe, insensitive jerk," she sweetly. "And I stand by it if you support offshore drilling."

"Actually, I think he just didn't care," Tucker said as they pulled up to Fenton Works.

"Home sweet home," Danny said as everyone exited the vehicle. "Welcome to Fenton Works, Charlie. Try not to be frightened by my family."

"They can't be that bad, can they?" she asked as Danny and Tucker followed her to the door dragging her bags. Sam snickered quietly behind them and watched as the door opened, Maddie and Jack Fenton crowding the doorway.

The open happy looks on their faces faded into quiet confusion, and Jack was the first one to recover. "Danny, I thought Charlie was a guy."

xXx

Thank god Danny's room was quiet, Sam thought as she settled herself on to his bed. Everyone else was downstairs making nice with Danny's little girl friend. Or going as far as to laugh over how he had ended up with a female roommate. Sam wasn't so amused, nor was she comfortable with the proprietary way Charlie watched Danny when she thought no one was looking.

It had been easily recognizable to Sam. After all, how could she miss it on another woman when it was something she wore so often herself?

With a sigh she drew out the focusing stone Danny had given her. She had already taken to carrying it with her all the time, comforted by it's weight in her pocket. She knew that part of that at least was because of the stone itself. Amber was the precious stone that she worked best with, and it already resonated to her. The bigger part, she knew, was because Danny had given it to her. Danny had obviously cared enough to go through the trouble of finding such a wonderful piece.

That Danny had listened to her well enough to catch a passing comment about how well she worked with amber.

That meant more than any of her other reasons. That Danny paid attention to her, was so much more attentive than he had been in high school. sure, high school had been rough, and he'd been a great friend then. But he'd gotten even better at it the older they all got. It made her smile to think that maybe the stone was already so connected to her because Danny had put so much thought into it as a gift.

She eyed it consideringly. That was a pretty thought, but it certainly did nothing to explain the odd tingle that was running down her mind as Charlie made nice with Tucker and the Fenton's. No, that was a different kettle of fish all together. And, to her, it felt like magic. But nothing she actively recognized. Not that she was a really talented mage.

Well, she was better than anyone she'd met so far, save Tucker. They were on a level, and every time one of them achieved something new, they got the other one on that boat as quickly as possible. But this suspicion… It smacked of jealousy. Or at least it would if she mentioned it to Tucker.

Instead, she would just check for herself. For Danny, she told herself. He had enough things going on without a ghost trying to get her hooks in him. But if she was a ghost, wouldn't his ghost sense go off? Maybe, she thought. Maybe not. No sense in taking a chance, she decided and the amber drifted up from her hand to float carefully in front of her face, even with her eyes.

This was new, she realized with a startled laugh. She and the stone were definitely in tune, because she hadn't even tapped into the energy fields she'd learned to manipulate. It was like the amber knew what she wanted it to do, and it did.

Sam let her eyes slide closed and she brushed her black hair back over her shoulder absently as she reached out to the stone, and through it to a nearby ley line in the park. She grabbed it with her mental hands and siphoned a bit of the power off. Not much, but enough to fuel the spell that was taking shape in her mind. A spell of true sight, she'd decided on.

She sighed as she let her mind wander down the stairwell to the living room and the people that were gathered there. Jack and Maddie were as normal as normal could be to her enhanced sight, and she turned to Jazz. A faint aura, she saw, tinged in an orange red that indicated… Oh, Jazz was in love with someone. How wonderful, Sam thought absently as she turned to Danny.

Immediately she smiled. It made her mental eyes ache a little as he flickered slowly back and forth, but both of his forms were well known to Sam. After all, she'd known Danny Fenton since she'd been in grade school, and she'd been there when Danny Phantom had been created. How could either be strange to her?

Tucker was a different story, and Sam wondered what she would look like to this way of seeing. Outside of magic Tucker looked like… well, a geek. He was tallish, maybe six feet, and he was definitely on the scrawny side. But the shape that lived underneath that skin was so different! Tall and broad and looking well versed in battle. But instead of a sword he carried a book and a—Sam laughed uncontrollably—PDA.

It was the laugh that did it, she realized. Not the ley line, not the spell, not even the magic or her absence. It was the laugh that had Tucker sitting up a little straighter and looking around the room as she silently begged him not to look up and see her above them. But, as if he could hear her plea, he looked up and his green eyes went wide.

'Sam?' he mouthed up at her, and without even a second glance Sam turned to Charlie. To Charlie, who's skin seemed to waver, but other than that one little difference looked quite as normal as the rest of the Fenton's but for Danny. So normal that it made her head ache as Danny's bedroom door burst open and Sam snapped her mind back inside herself with an audible noise.

"Sam," Tucker said accusingly. "You can't just go around using true sight!"

"I just wanted to make sure," she said defensively.

Tucker snatched the amber out of the air where it floated in front of Sam and frowned. "Make sure of what? That she's not a soul sucking demon bent on using Danny Fenton to get to Danny Phantom?" His frown softened a little. "She's not Paulina, Sam."

Sam sighed and flopped back on Danny's pillow, grabbing one of stuffing it over her face with a muffled shriek. "I know," she said into and Tucker plucked the pillow off her face. "I know she's not, but I can't help it. There's something weird about her."

"Because Danny's such a bad looking guy that a girl can't be attracted to him without an ulterior motive?"

Sam flushed. "I didn't mean that. Danny's not… Oh no, you're not tricking me into anything Mr. I'm-Married-To-My-PDA-And-It's-Probably-Recording-This-Conversation." Sam frowned. "I don't want him to get hurt."

Tucker grinned and sank to the bed next to her, dropping the pillow between them. "You don't want any competition."

"Go to hell," Sam ground out as she grabbed the pillow up and swing it at Tucker.

Tucker grabbed at it unsuccessfully and ducked, only catching a corner against the side of his head. "Don't take it out on me, Sam," he protested. "You can't blame me if you sit on your ass. Make a move!"

She swung the pillow again, landing a good solid thwacking hit against his back when she shrieked as the door opened and Danny popped his head in saying, "What move?"

He grinned and tumbled in through the door, Charlie following behind him with a considering gaze at Sam. He gave a war cry and dove for the bed, coming up with a pillow in each hand and swinging out randomly, knocking Sam into Tucker and Tucker off the bed. Sam laughed as she swung the pillow at him, knocking him to the side, and raising her chin smugly.

"I got you, Fenton." She yelped as he swung back on her, and she ducked back, head coming perilously close to cracking open on the side of the floor as she began to fall off. Before she could be even more than a little afraid two strong, sure arms were wrapping around her waist and pulling her back. "Thanks," she said breathlessly as she glanced at the floor, and then at Charlie.

"Oh, yeah. Save the chick, let Tucker fall down and break is neck," Tucker muttered as his head popped up from the far side of the bed. "At least it's bigger than your old bed. You would've sent us all off with the dive you made."

"You do this often?" Charlie asked with a faint smile, though her eyes slid over Sam, making the girl bite her lip in annoyance at being dismissed so easily.

Instead of being catty she settled a little more where she sat on Danny's bed, one leg draped over his and his arms still tightly around her. "Often enough," she said with a tight smile, purposely letting one hand smooth over Danny's own before she moved abruptly and stood, edging away from the bed and towards the desk.

It just felt weird, she admitted to herself, to use Danny like that. Even if she wasn't technically using him. Then again, she thought with a delighted smile as she sat down at his computer (for lack of anything better to do with the other girl watching her so closely), she wouldn't mind using him. Not at all.

"What kind of music do you like," she asked, turning to Charlie with a smile, completely ignoring a smirking Tucker who was easing himself back up onto the bed with a grimace as he rubbed a hip, and a gob smacked Danny who was staring at Sam like he'd never seen her before.

Oblivious, she thought with accustomed frustration.

"Oh, I listen to a little of everything," Charlie tossed off with a fluttering wave a hand that reminded Sam forcefully of her own mother.

She shrugged and opened Danny's music files, scanning through before double clicking on the tab that would sort through and play her chosen genre: rock. A heavy beat drifted out of the speakers and she smiled as she swiveled back to face Danny, who was still looking rather odd in the face, and tried to push the urge to claw at Charlie's eyes as she sat down on Danny's bed like she'd been lounging next to him fro years.

_Bitch,_ Sam thought disgustedly.

xXx

For his part, Danny was handling his reaction to Sam in a pretty decent manner. Since she'd dropped a pillow across his lap when he'd saved her from cracking her head open he could tactfully sit on his bed until his rather obvious reaction to Sam practically straddling him disappeared. What he couldn't handle were the pointed looks Tucker was shooting in his direction. A rather obvious mix of smugness and 'I told you so' that made Danny want to sink into the ground.

Instead, he only shot a tiny glare at Tucker before smiling over at Charlie. "We're usually pretty juvenile. You get used to it after a while. I think."

She laughed, and he caught a flash of annoyance on Sam's face. "Considering that my own family is fairly dysfunctional when we get together, I'd say that this is surprisingly normal."

"Dysfunctional doesn't even begin to cover the Fenton's," Sam muttered as she opened a new window on Danny's computer, pointedly turning her back on Danny and Charlie. "At Christmas time, you'd think Jack had regressed to toddler."

Tucker laughed at Danny's stricken expression, then began howling when Danny started to snicker. "Dude, she's got a point. Your dad is one of the weirdest guys I've ever met."

"I think he's very nice," Charlie said as she laid a hand on Danny's arm. "He's just enthusiastic."

There was a squeak and Danny's head shot up from Charlie to where Sam was sitting, and he could tell even from where he was that she was tensed. Probably furious. He tossed a smile at Charlie, not coming up with a tactful response, and glanced back at Sam. She was angry? She was definitely not happy.

_She was jealous._

The proverbial brick hit Danny square between the eyes, and he let out a strangled laugh that made Tucker and Charlie look at him oddly. Sam only squared her shoulders and calmly typed in the address to her e-mail server while he watched.

"Um, I'm thirsty. How about you guys?" he asked to everyone in general, his eyes never leaving Sam.

She didn't say anything, but Charlie beamed. "I'd love a glass of water," she said, and Danny scooted off the far side of the bed, opposite Charlie and practically shoving Tucker off in front of him.

"We can get snacks. You can help me, right, Tuck?" he said as he looped an arm around Tucker's neck in what might have been called brotherly fashion, but was actually more of a choke hold.

"Right," Tucker said as he stumbled out with Danny, waiting until they were to the stairs before yanking his head free and adjusting his beret. "You do realize that leaving them alone might not be the smartest thing in the world?"

And Tucker, since he wasn't actually expecting a response, promptly plowed into Danny's back as he stopped halfway down the stairs and glanced back up anxiously, like he'd be able to see into his room and know if Sam was okay. "Um, ow?" Tucker said as he readjusted his beret once again. "Give a guy a little warning next time."

"She's jealous," Danny blurted as Tucker shook his head.

"Dude, Charlie isn't jealous. She's an operator. I'm not sure jealousy is in her vocabulary," Tucker said as he shoved past Danny.

"No," Danny said as he grabbed Tucker's arm and turned the other man back to face him. "Sam. She's jealous of Charlie."

Tucker's jaw dropped. "Okay, who are you and what have you done with Danny Fenton?" Danny rolled his eyes and Tucker shook his head. "You actually figured it out? Mr. Oblivious had finally seen what's been in his face for five years?"

Danny flushed. "Alright, so I'm a little slow. Thanks for trying to tell me," he added as the two walked down the stairs and turned the corner into the kitchen.

"Are you actually going to do something about it?" Tucker asked as he dug four glasses out from the cabinet while Danny rummaged in the fridge for food. "Or are you going to sit there and let her suffer more?"

"Here," Danny said as he sat a pitched of iced tea and a pint of Sam's favorite fruit juice in front of Tucker. "Do you have any suggestions?"

Tucker was silent as he poured himself and Danny the tea, and Danny got some ice and water for Charlie. He left Sam's drink for Danny, smiling a little as he saw Danny snag a bag of mixed veggies for Sam to go with the more mundane lime and vinegar chips he liked, and a jar of salsa for the corn chips Tucker grabbed.

"Actually Danny, I haven't really got anything," he said as his mind raced. He was lying, of coarse. But in order for this to work he'd have to get Danny and Sam alone. Or at least arrange something without Charlie. Because that girl was way too interested in his best friend for anyone's good.

"Oh," Danny said, and scooped up Sam's juice and his tea with his chips and her carrots and broccoli. Tucker grabbed the rest, smug as he followed Danny back up the stairs. The halfa hadn't even thought about it as he'd automatically picked up Sam's things, leaving his roommate's for Tucker to carry and serve.

They shoved into the room and were greeted by a tense silence and no obvious change in anything that they had left. Sam was still staring blankly at the computer screen and Charlie was still staring at Sam. Glaring, Danny realized, and automatically moved over to the chair Sam was sitting in.

"Hey," he said quietly and she turned to face him. Without a word he handed her the glass with fruit juice and the bag of veggies, smiling as he did so.

He settled back on the bed a careful distance away from Charlie and broke open his chips while Charlie took her water from Tucker without a word. She tossed a glance at Danny, then to Sam and back to the halfa. "Vegetables?" she asked, trying not sound prying.

Danny shrugged and stared straight at Sam. "Sam's a vegetarian. She likes those things."

"Ultra-Recyclo Vegetarian," she corrected as she crunched into a carrot. "It means—" and Danny cut her off.

"It means she doesn't eat anything with a face." He grinned at her and Tucker snickered. Sam's food choices had gotten them into some trouble over the years. She had habitually released the frogs designated for dissection, and released numerous class pets.

"You seem to know everything about Sam, don't you?" Charlie murmured with a pondering glance between the two.

"Yeah," Danny said softly as he caught Sam's lavender eyes with his own. "I do know everything about her.


	3. Chapter 3

Beneath the Surface

3

_She hated changing plans. It was so degrading to have to adjust for the vagaries of human emotion. But, she told herself, no one could say that she wasn't prepared to act quickly when the need arose. Nor was she too proud and sure of her plan to refrain from any type of spying at all._

_It she had been, the plan would most certainly have been destroyed._

_And that wasn't going to happen. Not now, not ever. She would become immortal. She had found the way to do it, the way to negate her bastardization and become everything that she wanted. Silence reigned as she narrowed her eyes in the darkness to the hairbrush in her hand. A half dozen raven hairs were tangled within, and she plucked several out, letting them tangle around her fingers._

"_Very soon," she promised the night. "Very soon."_

xXx

"I never said that it was wrong to dislike the girl. I only said that maybe you're overreacting a little." Tucker winced at the anger that radiated off of his best friend. "I stand corrected. A lot. Sam, you're being ridiculous."

"Ridiculous? She was hanging all over him!" Sam spat in annoyance. "And that was on the phone. I couldn't talk to him for even five seconds without hearing her two _inches_ from the goddamned phone."

"Do you think you could at least act civilized? I don't think Danny would appreciate you butchering someone he's invited to spend the summer with him," Tucker asked as Fenton Works came into view.

"And what the hell is that about?" she exclaimed, making no promises at all. "He brought a _girl_ home. He's never done that before," she continued more quietly. "Do you think he's actually interested in her?"

Tucker laughed and ducked the punch Sam aimed at the space where his head had been. "I think it's more because Danny thinks she's a nice girl, and she was going to be spending the summer rattling around their dorm because she doesn't have any family."

"Fucking hero complex," she muttered as they took the stairs to Danny's house two at a time. She dug her key chain out of her pocket and unlocked the door, letting them in, and they called greetings into the kitchen as they headed up the stairs.

"He's still asleep," Tucker said as Sam opened Danny's door. "It's already afternoon, and he's still asleep."

"Tucker," Sam drawled. "We've only been up for an hour."

With a running leap she jumped up on the bed, making sure she landed directly on top of the sleep sprawled halfa. "Wake up, wake up!" she sung out as she bounced on top of him, grinning widely at the groans every time she landed on him.

"Sam," Danny said blearily as his head poked out from under the blanket. "You're evil. Get off me. Go 'way. I'm sleeping."

"Not anymore," she said. "Tucker, you should jump on him, too."

"Jump on me and there won't be enough of you left to even make it to the Ghost Zone," Danny said and pulled the blanket back over his head.

"No fair. How come she gets to bounce all over you?" Tucker asked as he leaned in the doorway, amused.

An arm snaked out from beneath the sheets and hooked around Sam's waist, dragging her back as half of the pile moved and settled on top of her. "She's warm and she's soft."

Tucker bit back the laugh at Sam's surprised face. It was too precious, and he dug his PDA out of his pocket and held it up, snapping a picture of Sam and Danny. Well, of Sam and a pile of blankets and sheets wrapped around her. Blackmail, he decided as he saved the first one and snapped several more in quick succession.

Blackmail for years to come.

"I'm warm and soft, too" Tucker said with mock dignity as he tucked his PDA away.

"She's a girl," came the muffled comment from the bed, and Sam laughed, red faced and struggling to get away.

"It only took you how many years to notice that fact?" she teased carefully, desperately trying not to do or say anything that she might regret. But it was so nice… His arm was holding on to her tightly and she could feel the way he was pressed up against her as he tried to sleep more.

It was something she'd thought about more than she wanted to admit.

"You have to get up, Danny," she finally said, pulling the blanket down from where she thought his head was. She was right and was rewarded with messy black hair and bright blue eyes blinking owlishly at the sudden change in light. "We have to go to the mall, and the zoo, and I know you're supposed to show Charlie around."

Tucker grinned approvingly as Sam included Danny's guest without too much animosity in her voice. "Yeah, Delilah's been bred to that other Purple-back Gorilla, and the result is a girl."

"You guys are going to mock me for that forever, aren't you?" he asked with a resigned sigh. "I'm up, I'm up."

He sat up, letting Sam go with a hint of reluctance and swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He stood and stretched feeling the bones down his spine pop loudly. With a yawn he headed for his still packed bags and tossed one on the bed next to Sam, opening it and rummaging for clean clothes before noticing her horrified expression.

He looked down, confused. "What? I'm wearing sweatpants. It's not like you haven't seen me shirtless before," he said more than a little self-conscious.

"Yeah, but dude, you didn't have that the last time we saw you half naked," Tucker said as his eyes trailed down a long winding scar that ran from Danny's shoulder to below the waistband of the sweatpants.

"What happened?" Sam asked as she moved behind him and touched the shiny pink skin of it, making him shiver. "It looks like someone was trying to…"

"Kill me?" Danny asked wryly. "They were. Ghost problem back in February. I took care of it," he said as he tugged a shirt out of the suitcase, then a pair of jeans. "Remind me not to go shirtless anywhere near Jazz. Or Mom and Dad," he added as an after thought.

"You really have to be more careful, Danny," Sam said softly as she glanced at the scar one last time. "I kind of like having you around. I don't want you dead. Well, more dead than you already are," and Danny laughed.

"Don't worry. I've been a lot more careful since that," he said, then grabbed Sam by the shoulders and steered her firmly to the door. "Now out, both of you. I don't put on free shows."

"But you charge?" Sam asked with a quirked lip, and grabbed Tucker as she headed for the stairs.

"I'll pay for her," Tucker called back as his feet hit the stairs. He heard a laugh from down the hall and then Danny's door closed. "I would, though."

Sam sighed, glared and jerked Tucker's beret down over his face as they hit the ground floor. "You're a pig, Tucker."

"Speaking of pigs," he said with a sniff as he followed his nose to the kitchen. "Breakfast for lunch. Canadian bacon, maple bacon, regular bacon. And sausage!" he exclaimed in delight. "Who cooked? I'll marry whoever cooked."

Jazz whacked him on the back of the head with a spatula as she shoved past him into the kitchen. "I'm already taken. Sam's right, you're a pig."

"Since when do you cook?" Sam asked as she slid into an empty chair and grabbed for a box of cereal.

Jazz's face flushed pink and she turned back to the stove where various meat products were sizzling. "Oh, I picked up a few things at school," she said quickly.

Too quickly, and Sam smiled widely. "I know your Harvard dorms don't have kitchens. And you aren't taking anything related to cooking."

"Jazz has a boyfriend!" Tucker said as he darted a hand past her and snatched up a hot sausage. "Wait till I tell Danny."

"No!" Jazz yelped. "Don't you dare!"

Sam laughed. Danny's penchant for running off Jazz's boyfriends was legendary. The last time he'd decided someone she was dating wasn't worthy, he'd made a deal with Technus to take over the poor kid's computer and harass him that way. That relationship had been doomed, and she snickered at the pun, from the start.

That was when Sam caught the flash of light from Jazz's left hand, and started coughing as she nearly inhaled her spoonful of cereal. "Engaged," she choked out as Jazz laughed nervously, shoving her hand behind her back.

"No I'm not," she laughed nervously.

"You are, too," Tucker said as he twirled Jazz around to grab her left hand and look at the ring on the third finger. He whistled. "Nice."

She blushed and pulled her hand back, turning back to the food and beginning to dump various fried meat products on a platter. She slid it on the table and smoothed her hair back. "I haven't told Danny yet, so can you not say anything?"

Sam shrugged. "You have to tell us how you snuck him past Danny first."

"Who?" Danny asked as he ducked into the kitchen, trailed by Charlie. "And if we're sneaking people past me, why are they being snuck in the first place?"

"Nothing, Danny," Jazz said brightly as she spooned a pan full of scrambled eggs onto a plate and dropped it on the table. She'd nearly made it out of the kitchen, too, before Danny's hand snapped out and locked on her wrist with a surprisingly strong grip. She winced and looked back at him.

"Jazz," he said evenly.

"Danny," she replied and sighed. "Alright, fine. Mom and Dad already know. They approve, so you leave Ryan alone, do you hear me?"

"Ryan?" Danny asked blankly, and Sam and Tucker glanced at each other with matching grins. "Who's Ryan?"

"Ryan is my fiancé," Jazz said as she tossed her hair back.

"I've never met him. I've never even heard of him. How long have you two been dating? Are you having sex with him?" Danny asked, face a mix of disgust and anger. "Are you—"

"Danny," Sam interjected as she scooped up another spoonful of her cereal. "I don't think anyone needs to know that."

"And it's none of your business, either," Jazz said as she pulled her arm out of Danny's lax grip. "If I have my way, you won't meet him until the wedding," and with that she spun on her heel and stalked up the stairs to her room.

"What the hell?" Danny exclaimed as he sat down at the table. Sam rolled her eyes and Tucker only heaped meat high on his plate.

Charlie took a plate herself and spooned a little of the egg onto it before asking, "Is it always like this?"

Sam glanced at her but didn't say anything. Tucker grinned as he speared a piece of Canadian bacon. "You should have seen what Danny did to Jazz's boyfriend in freshman year."

"Ah, alright," Charlie said and shook her head. "So, what's on for today?"

"Zoo," Danny muttered as he grabbed a couple of pieces of bacon and dropped them immediately as Sam glared at the meat in his hand. He dropped it and grabbed a bowl, pouring some cereal and dumping milk over it. "Zoo and the tour."

"Mall," Sam said as she finished her cereal. "Don't forget the mall."

"I don't do malls," Danny said. "It requires shopping, which takes years."

"Mall," Sam repeated. "Yes mall, yes shopping. They've got this little souvenir shop that carries all sorts of Danny Phantom merchandise," she said with an evil grin. "And I want a Danny Phantom plushy."

Danny groaned. "No mall. No plushy. Please?" and he turned on the puppy dog face.

Sam glared, and then fought back the smile, and then finally scowled. "Alright, fine. No mall. Zoo first, then tour."

"Are they always like this?" Charlie asked Tucker as she grabbed the last piece of bacon.

"Worse," he answered with a smile.

"Why the zoo?" she asked Danny.

"Have to see Delilah." He pushed his cereal around din the bowl and finally got up and poured it down the drain. "She had a baby, and I'm sort of honorary godfather."

"Delilah? Is she another friend?" Charlie asked, her eyes flickering blue from beneath her lashes as she watched Danny.

"If you call a for hundred pound gorilla a friend, yeah," Tucker said and offered Charlie the last sausage. She shook her head and he dropped it onto his plate, cutting it up and devouring it. "When we were fourteen, Danny had to do this report on the Purple-back gorilla, and he snuck into her cage and found out that the gorilla wasn't a boy, like everyone thought."

"You went into a gorilla cage? Weren't you scared?"

Danny shrugged, remembering that he'd been more afraid of ending up at the foot of Skulker's bed, a grisly blanket, than of an animal that spent hours scratching its butt. "Not really. She's sweet."

"Danny learned how to speak her language," Sam said.

"Come on, she scratches her butt most of the time," he said. "Can we please not regale Charlie with some of my more odd memories?"

Sam's eyes flashed but she didn't say anything. If Charlie noticed she didn't comment, but she did smile at Danny. "So is that what made you decide to be a vet?"

Danny looked up, startled. Then he laughed a little, making himself relax. "Actually, no. I just like helping people," he said and shot a glare at Sam as she coughed and he heard, 'hero complex,' behind it. "Bt, um, I'm not so good with people. So animals. Logical next step, you know?"

"Oh," Charlie said. "I've known I was going to be a vet since I was six. It's all I've ever wanted to do," and she smiled sweetly at Danny.

"So, zoo anyone?" Tucker finally said.

xXx

"I can't believe I let you two talk me into this," Sam muttered as they crept through the shadows outside of the recreation center. "We haven't done this since we were like…"

"The night we graduated," Tucker offered. "That was only a couple of years ago. Quit acting so old. You're not a grown up yet."

Danny snickered as he dropped his hands on his best friends' shoulders and concentrated for a moment. A familiar emptiness spread through him and he dragged them forward, through the walls and the locker rooms before dropping the intangibility at the pool deck. He let go of them and unslung his towel from around his neck, dropping it on a lounge and grinning as he stripped his shirt off.

"Sure is easy to sneak in when you can walk through walls, huh?" he asked Sam as he shimmied his jeans down.

"You could say that," Sam said, turning her back to Danny and pulling the oversized shirt she was wearing off, and tossing it onto the pile of clothes Danny and Tucker had started.

"Um, are you feeling okay, Sam?" Danny asked as Tucker stared back and forth between Danny and Sam.

"Yeah, why?" she asked calmly as she slid her shorts down slim legs. "Do I look sick?"

"Sam, you're wearing a bikini. This doesn't strike you as odd?" Danny asked as checked the tie on his own trunks. He vividly recalled the last time they'd done this, and he'd ended up swimming around naked for twenty minutes while Sam and Tucker played keep away with his trunks. Of course, they'd done it the time before that, and the time before that too…

"Nope," she said and tugged the tie out of her hair. "Last one in has to buy breakfast."

There was a scramble between the two boys as Tucker tugged his glasses off and tossed them to the clothes as Danny shoved past him. "Hey, no fair," Tucker called as Danny phased through him. "No powers." Then he was following the other two into the water and promptly trying to yank Danny's trunks off.

"Hey!" Danny shouted as he kicked away and shoved Sam in between him and Tucker. "He's trying to strip me," he yelped and Sam's fingers were suddenly on his waist, trying to yank his trunks off. "Evil!" he shouted and ducked under the water, phasing his trunks from her prying fingers.

When he came up they were laughing ten feet away and he was sputtering water. "Why do you guy have to do that every time we sneak in here?"

"Because one day, you won't get your trunks back, and they'll be found at the bottom of the pool the next morning," Sam called as she flipped over on her back and floated. She went under as Tucker pushed a wave of water at her, and when she came back up Danny's hands were tight around her and fiddling with the ties of her bikini top.

"Fair's fair," he said with a grin as he managed to grab a string and tug, only to be surprised when nothing happened and she put her hands on top of his head and pushed him under. He came back up, water streaming from his hair and she laughed at him.

"Double knots, Danny."

"Figures," he said. "Wanna pants Tucker?"

She grinned and they took off to the deep end where Tucker was floating face down. His head shot up as he felt hands grab his ankles, and then he shouted as another set of hands grabbed the hem of his trunks and tugged. He coughed water as he managed to sip away and swam desperately for the side of the pool, grabbing on and hoisting himself out.

"Tucker doesn't do naked in public places," he shouted as he pulled his legs out of the water, his eyes glued to the two dark figures floating less than five feet from him. "You guys suck."

Danny laughed as Tucker tugged as his trunks, trying to hoist them back up to his waist, and laughing when the string was too tight and kept the trunks permanently stuck at his hips. "Shut it," Tucker muttered. "Damn. Damn you both. You knotted the damned thing."

He stood up, water dripping. "I'll be back. I have to fix this." And with a self conscious tug at his trunks he stalked off towards the interior of the rec center. And he grinned as he threw a pointed look at Danny over his shoulder. He snorted as he made it out of sight and tugged his trunks back into proper place. They were so gullible.

"It's a good thing that the locker rooms don't have locks," Danny said as he kicked slowly towards Sam.

She tilted back so she was floating, and let herself just drift. "I think he's just trying to play with his PDA," she said.

"Probably," Danny mused. He blinked water out of his eyes and flipped over so that he was floating next to Sam, wondering if he had enough guts to do what he wanted. Of course, he could always just drown… "You look nice, Sam," he said, resolutely staring up at the night sky.

"Because you've never seen me in anything this small?" she asked and flipped over, letting her legs dangle down as she kept herself afloat with quick swishing motions of her hands.

He followed suit and swam a little closer. "No, because you look nice."

She smiled. "You don't ever say things like that. What are you up to?" With a quick turn she was peering after Tucker. "You guys didn't set me up or something, did you?"

Danny laughed and let his legs drift down until he was just barely touching the bottom. With himself stabilized he reached out and grabbed Sam around the waist, turning her back to him and pulling her close. "If anything was set up, I didn't do it." He let his fingers slide through her hair as it swirled in the water behind her. "I like your hair long."

She looked at him oddly. "Okay." She looked away with a frown. "You didn't want to sneak your friend in."

"No. I didn't."

"How'd you manage to get Jazz to cover for you?" Sam asked, pushing away from him slowly and kicking back towards the wall so that she can hang against it, her back against the smooth concrete side.

Danny shrugged and followed her with two strong strokes of his arms. "I told her that tonight was for us. For me and my best friends. Charlie," and he paused for a moment. "Charlie is nice and all. But she's not you."

"She's interested."

"I'm not," he said firmly and reached a hand out to thread through her hair as he was pulling her closer. "Charlie is not my type, Sam."

"And just what is your type?" she asked, her heart beating a little faster as his blue yes darkened a little.

He smiled a little, crooked and sweet. "You are." She had a second to try and process what he'd said before his mouth was hot on hers, and she blinked twice before realizing he was kissing her. Her lips curved as his moved firm and insistently against hers, and the hand in her hair fisted as she closed her eyes and flicked her tongue against his lower lip.

"Sam," he whispered before he kissed her again, and this time it wasn't so gentle as it had been before. It was hot, demanding and needy all at once, and she surrendered herself to it completely as his arms wrapped around her, letting him hold her up in the water as they kissed.

"That was…" he said as he pulled back, his eyes lidded and heavy.

"Nice," she said.

He smiled and kissed her chastely. "I was going to go with a long time coming. But nice works, too."

She hugged him close for a moment, her cheek pressed against his, the itchy feel of stubble driving it home to her that this was Danny. Not Danny the boy, that she'd fallen in love with so many years before, but Danny the man, that she still loved now. She smiled as her lips found his again, and her fingers clenched at the skin of his back as he willingly returned the kiss.

"Sam, I—" and he cut off with a groan as a wisp of blue streamed from his mouth. "I swear, they plan these things. Let me take care of this, I'll be right back. Don't… don't change your mind, okay?"

Sam smiled at the desperate disbelief in his voice. "If I haven't changed my mind since I was fourteen, I don't think I'm going to right now," and he shot her a brilliant smile as he ducked under the water with a flash of brilliant white light.

Moments later Danny Phantom was flying up out of the water and disappearing over the roof of the rec center's fitness complex leaving Sam to duck under water and scream. Just scream, nothing in particular, just scream, because she couldn't believe that Danny had actually figured it out. Sure, it took him a long time. A really long time, but he'd figured it out.

He'd even made the first move, she thought with a smile as she pushed off against the bottom of the pool, arms above her to break the surface. She was nearly there when something grabbed her by the foot, and then wrapped around her ankle, and she was jerked back down with another scream.

She kicked furiously but she couldn't break away from what it was, and through the dark water and the cloud of her hair she caught the glimpse of shining white skin and long talon like claws digging into her skin as she fought. She tried to gather her magic around her but her focus was broken as one of the claws bit into the flesh above her ankle and sliced through until it hit bone.

She screamed then, a real scream, agonized as she inhaled water from habit. She choked and her eyes widened giving her one last chance to see her assailant. But there was nothing beyond vivid yellow eyes and on instinct she punched out at it, feeling the satisfying thud that reverberated up her arm as she connected.

But it wasn't enough, and she was dragged down further until she was on the bottom again, and the edges of her vision were going black. Between the water shed accidentally breathed in, the lack of oxygen that was burning her lungs like fire, and the water she could feel even now as it trickled down her throat to fill her…

She was going to die.

In a heartbeat she accepted that, and closed her eyes, ready to surrender. If only she could take this monster who was killing her with her into death. Darkness filtered to gray, and then to black. Her last conscious thought was that at least she'd kissed Danny before she died.

xXx

Tucker had finally made a circuit of the entire interior hallway of the rec center when he decided it might be safe to go back. Or maybe not. Personally, he was hoping he could interrupt something. It was always more fun to make them blush. The brighter, the better, he thought with a grin as he headed down the hall that led back out to the pool.

His confusion as he found the pool empty was obvious. Their clothes were all still there, so obviously they weren't planning on pranking him by ditching him. He glanced around and wondered if maybe they'd hidden inside the complex to scare him, but there was only one trail of water from the pool, and even at that it wasn't enough for them to have simply walked where he had.

He was beginning to think that maybe Danny had gone ghost and taken Sam flying when he noticed a very dark shape underneath the blue-black water of the pool. "Danny? Sam?" he called as he walked to the edge and peered down.

"Alright, good joke. You got me, so come on out," he said with a little laugh as he looked around, expecting for Danny to come out of the bushes and Sam to shoot up from the bottom of the pool. With the mass of hair floating around the head, the person in the pool could only be Sam…

But no one was coming out, and Tucker's heart beat a little faster. "Guys, you got me. Come on," he said a little more loudly, and a moment later he thought that maybe it wasn't a joke after all, and he found himself diving under the water before he thought past that.

It was Sam, and she wasn't moving, not even when he grabbed her by the waist and pushed up from the bottom of the pool, pulling her along and dragging her hair out of her face when they broke the surface. _She's not breathing,_ he thought frantically and he paddled furiously with one arm to the side of the pool, hooking himself on it and then pushing her up over the side to lie in a crumpled heap on the deck.

He heaved himself out and grabbed her, rolling her onto her back and shoving at her hair, fingers pressing to her wrists, her throat, and finding nothing but smooth, still, cold skin. "Sam," he whispered. "CPR. I can do CPR," he said, and tilted her head back, remembering all of the stupid health classes he'd tried to tune out and paid attention to only because his PDA had been confiscated.

Her airway was clear, there was no pulse, she wasn't breathing. He pressed his mouth to hers, sealing them together and breathing into her. Sam's chest rose a little, and he breathed into her again before pressing his fisted hands to her chest, above her heart, and pushing once, twice, three, four and five times. Nothing, he realized, and breathed into her mouth again, fingers frozen in fear as he pinched her nose closed and just breathed.

Breathe, pump. Breathe pump, and then a cry from above him and a startling flash of light as Danny dropped down next to him. "Tuck, what happened?"

"I don't know, get my cell and call an ambulance," Tucker yelled as he breathed, pumped, breathed again. She was still cold, so still. Breathe, pump.

Danny hadn't moved, and Tucker looked up at him. "Danny, get my fucking phone," he yelled. "Call for an ambulance, she needs to get to the hospital."

It was only then that he realized that Danny wasn't looking at him, or at Sam. He was crying and looking at empty air behind where Sam's body was lying. He was crying, and somehow that struck Tucker as terribly wrong, and Danny dropped to his knees next to Tucker, pushing his hands off of Sam and grabbing her up and holding her close.

"It's too late," he said dully through his tears. "It's too late."

Tucker tried to grab Sam back, to keep at the CPR, but Danny shook his head and pushed him away as Tucker's eyes burned. "Tucker, it's too late. She's standing next to you." Tucker turned and found nothing, and then back to Danny. Danny's eyes were glowing green, and bright with tears.

"It's too late. She's already dead. She's right next to you."


	4. Chapter 4

Beneath the Surface

4

_It had been closer than she liked, and in more ways than the one, the creature thought with annoyance. If she had not been ready to move, the night could have ended in true disaster. The other friend had nearly seen her, and it was impossible for her to move in faster, not injured and burdened as she was._

_The witch packed quite a punch, even under eight feet of water._

_But perhaps it could be turned to her advantage. The halfa had made his advances, the witch had accepted them and him. His grief would be multiplied by losing her only minutes after they found each other. A modern day Romeo and Juliet, she laughed to herself as she drifted through the Ghost Zone to her current goal. He'd been so terribly distraught…_

_It would make it so much easier for him to turn to her now. In his grief, he could be easily manipulated._

xXx

It had been hard, listening to Danny as he said that Sam was dead. Harder still to know that the halfa could see her, where Tucker saw nothing, but he knew that was only because Danny was half ghost himself. Tucker stumbled over to the pile of clothes the three had left near the pool and dug out his pants, unzipping on of the cargo pockets and pulling out his PDA, discarding it to the side, and then finding his cell.

For a moment he found his finger straying to dial 911, but after a moment he realized that doing that wouldn't help anything. Instead he dialed the number to the police station from his speed dial, almost screaming because he actually had the emergency numbers for Amity Park programmed in at all. They weren't there so that he could tell them someone was dead. Not ever if it was Danny or Sam.

Ironic, he thought as the phone rang uselessly. He'd always thought that if any of the three were going to die before old age, it would be Danny. Despite being half ghost, half dead, chock full of ghostly powers and with more innate strength than any three men Tucker had ever met… He'd always expected that Danny would fall to someone, something, before he could die a natural death.

"Amity Park Police Department."

The ringing was gone, and a strict and professional voice was echoing in Tucker's ear. He closed his eyes as tears slipped down his cheeks, leaving hot wet paths over his dark skin. "Hello? Is this an emergency?"

"No," he choked out, his throat tight against the need to cry. "No, it's not an emergency anymore. My friend," and he stopped as his voice caught in his throat, threatening to rip out in a sob. "She—we were swimming. I found her. She's—she's—"

He couldn't finish it. He tried, but he couldn't finish it, and the dam broke under the pressure that had been building.

"Sir, where are you located at?"

"We're at the rec center. We snuck in," Tucker whispered. He vaguely heard woman telling that help was on its way, to stay where he was, and he hung up the phone so he didn't have to listen to the way she spoke, so understanding, so caring. He dropped the phone on his clothes and hesitated before going back to Danny and Sam.

It was painful to watch, the way her head hung limp and lifeless against his shoulder as he rocked her back and forth. Even more painful the way Danny's free hand, the one that wasn't clutching her desperately, was stroking through her wet and tangled hair like maybe she'd open her eyes and tell him to stop, that she was fine, that it was a horrible, horrible mistake.

But she didn't move, save for the way her body moved with Danny. Her eyes didn't open, her chest refused to rise and fall on its own. Tucker dropped down to the ground next to his two best friends and buried his head in his hands.

He could hear Danny whispering to her. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I love you, Sam," in a broken voice that couldn't get any louder than the barest sound. "Please, Sam, I love you."

Sirens began to wail in the distance and Tucker's eyes closed, his hands covered his ears as he tried to block it out. The sirens, Danny's voice, the sight of her… dead. He barely looked up as a hand clamped down on his shoulder and a uniformed officer shined a light down on him.

He glanced over at Danny and was surprised to see that Danny was still clinging to Sam, refusing to let them take her body. He wondered how he'd managed to block out so many people, so much noise, and his mind filtered through to him saying, _Shock_. Yes, shock. It would let him escape it all, but he couldn't do that.

As hard as it was, he couldn't just escape it. Years of dealing with things no one, much less a child, should have to deal with had taught him that much. Even if you block it out, it'll still be there. He looked back at Danny, blinking dully as he heard Danny shout, "No," when paramedics tried to take Sam's body from him.

He shook off the police officer's hand and got to his feet, his steps faltering as he made his way to Danny, ignoring anyone and everyone who tried to talk to him as he knelt by Danny. "You have to let go, Danny. Let them take her," he said, trying to unwrap Danny from around the body.

The body. He swallowed thickly.

"I can't," Danny choked out, and Tucker blinked as tears welled again.

"You have to, man. Let go," he said again, and Danny's grip loosened. "Let her go."

He managed to get Danny to let her go and two paramedics lifted her up and laid her out on a stretcher. He turned away and back to Danny as they stretched a clean white sheet across the body, strapped it to the stretched and wheeled it past the people swarming the pool. There were some things that he didn't want to have to remember. He might not be able to ever forget the way Danny had held her, but he was sure as hell _not_ going to remember her as a shapeless form under a sheet.

"Son?" a deep voice said behind him, and Tucker turned. A police man with a notepad in his hands. "Can you tell me your name? What happened?"

Tucker nodded, blinking and swaying a little. He dropped down to the ground, not willing to chance passing out, and the policeman knelt. "You need some help?"

Tucker shook his head. "Just shock," he said thickly. "Tucker. My name's Tucker."

"Tucker what?" the officer asked patiently.

"Foley. Tucker Foley."

"And your friends?"

"Danny Fenton. Sam Manson. She's dead," he said, blinking owlishly as his eyes burned again. "I found her in the pool. She was just floating there. I thought it was a joke, that they were trying to mess with me." He stopped and wiped his eyes with the backs of his hands. "If I'd gone after her when I first got back, she might be alive."

The officer shook his head a little. "There's no need to think like that. Was there anyone with you?"

"No, just us."

"And no one around to see what happened, you say?" the man pressed, and Tucker jerked back from him.

"I didn't kill her. Neither did Danny. He wouldn't," Tucker spat as he struggled to his feet.

The man held up his hands, trying to calm Tucker down. "No one is saying you did. Matter of fact, it looks like an accidental drowning."

"I need to go to Danny," Tucker said numbly after the flash of anger passed and the silence stretched. He turned away and saw Danny huddled in on himself next to the pool, and headed for him. "Come on, Danny. Come one," he said as he hooked an arm around Danny and pulled him to his feet.

It didn't escape his notice that people stared at Danny, and Tucker was reminded of the angry scar across his back. It wasn't the only scar Danny bore as a badge of honor, but it was the worst. And the most recent. It might raise questions, but if they were intelligent they'd hold those particular questions.

In the mood Danny was in, he wouldn't be surprised if his best friend—and he closed his eyes against the pain of the lack of plural—went completely nuts on them.

He got Danny to one of the lounge chairs, away from the pool where people in almost official looking jackets were measuring things, writing things down, investigating he supposed. Danny wasn't crying anymore. That was something, but Tucker was unnerved by the blankness on Danny's face and when he sat next to him he wrapped an arm around the halfa's shoulders.

It was good, he supposed, that none of the jocks from high school could see him now. Mostly naked, holding on to a mostly naked Danny. It would have been pure gossip fodder, if not for the fact… that Sam had just… died sounded so harsh. So final. Drowned was an easier way to think of it, made it a little easier to push the surreal feel of it all into the front and almost pretend it was nothing but a terrible, terrible nightmare.

"They asked me where I was when it happened."

Tucker nearly jumped at the hollowness of Danny's voice, but nodded. "They asked me stuff, too."

"They asked me if I have an alibi, if I killed her."

Tucker said nothing. But then, for something like that he knew that nothing was probably the best thing he could say.

xXx

Tucker had been dropped off first. He didn't even have to face his family tonight if he didn't want to. He at least had brought a key. Danny was slumped in the backseat of a police cruiser as it made its way through the dark neighborhood, lights and sirens off, but to Danny that didn't make a difference.

He hadn't brought a key. He'd planned on flying home and phasing back inside his room.

The cruiser turned down his street and rolled to a slow stop in front of his house, still in the street, and the cop flipped a switch to set the lights running silently. He didn't look up as the man got out of the car and opened the back door, only slid out silently, trying to block out the entire horrible night.

It wasn't working very well, and he finally raised his face to look up at his house with the Fenton Works sign, the Op Center on top. The familiar and almost comforting bricks.

The thought that Sam would never wake him by jumping on him again.

That Sam would never smile at him again.

Sam would never kiss him again.

He swallowed the tears down, blanking his mind as best he could and grabbing the wet towel that he'd left in the seat before letting the cop close the door as he trudged up the walk to his front door. Nineteen years old, nearly twenty, and he was having to knock to be let in. It was almost embarrassing.

He wished it was.

He laid a hand against the door for a moment, then made a fist and rapped loudly three times on the door. The red and white lights flashed behind him, making dizzying patterns out of his shadow against the door, and he blinked a couple of times, breathing deeply as he looked up into the inky darkness. There was no noise from inside, and he knocked again, three more times, louder than before.

Still nothing, and he gave up on knocking and kicked the door twice, letting his frustration out and wincing at a cracking, splintering sort of sound. But it worked, and a light came on upstairs where he could see it. His parents' room, and then Jazz's. The room Charlie was using was dark, but maybe she assumed the family would deal with middle of the night visitors.

He heard footsteps on the stairs, then the scratch as the peephole's cover was lifted. He was almost sure that if he peeked through the little hole he'd see an eye, but the disjointed image his mind gave him at the thought drove it out of him. Then the deadbolt was thrown.

"Jack," he heard his mother call, and the door opened. Her face was a study of surprise at her son being brought home in the wee hours of the morning by a policeman. With lights flashing, even, and Danny looked up at her bleakly.

"Is something… wrong?" she asked hesitantly.

"No, ma'am. He needed a ride," the cop said, and Danny's fingers tightened on the towel.

Nothing wrong.

Indeed. Sam was dead, and nothing was wrong. He knew logically that the question had been about Danny, the parental code of, 'Is he under arrest,' and that the answer wasn't against Sam, or what had happened. It wasn't meant to belittle her, to demean her death, to say that she wasn't important enough that her dying counted as something wrong.

He knew it. Logically. But as his father thundered down the stairs with the Fenton Anti Creep Stick in his hands, Danny was struck by the absurdity of it all. He was shaking by the time his father reached the door, the bat—and Danny hissed the word in his mind—bat and not some stupid name that started with Fenton—his fury and pain colliding violently inside him.

"Then what exactly is wrong?" Maddie said to the officer, her sliding glance at Danny making him stand a little straighter and stare down at his mother, then up at his father.

"What's wrong?" he said softly, woodenly. "Sam's dead."

Her mouth dropped, his father's face morphed into sorrow, and Danny stood there for a moment. "Sam's dead," he said again, and pushed past them, up the stairs, nearly knocking Jazz down as he found his room and slammed the door closed.

He collapsed against the back of the door, head in hands, still damp hair dripping water down his skin. "Sam's dead," he whispered to his room, and cried.

xXx

"_You're being awful silly," she said as she bumped him with her hip._

_Danny blinked at her, pulling her close and tucking her under his arm. "It's not silly. I love you." He leaned over and planted a kiss on her cheek. "Besides, we've got forever ahead of us."_

_She laughed and broke away from him, stretching her arms out and spinning in a circle. "This is what love feels like," she called out as she spun faster and then fell to the grass, dizzy and laughing, calling out for him to join her. "This is what it's like to give everything up for someone else."_

"_No control," he murmured as he laid down on the grass beside her. "Out of control, completely unable to be rational. Doing the silliest things." He smiled and pressed a kiss to her lips. "I don't want to be without you."_

"_I'm always with you."_

_He frowned and sat up, staring down at her. That wasn't right. It didn't make sense, and the frown deepened as he bit his lip. "Sam," he said. Then he shook his head, unable to figure out what he wanted to say, or even what it was he was feeling._

_She pushed up, settling back on her elbows as she watched him. I'm always with you, Danny. Don't forget that. Promise me that you won't forget that."_

"_I promise, Sam."_

_She smiled and sat up, leaning over and kissing him gently, one hand sliding to his cheek and pulling him closer. "I like being in love with you," she whispered against his mouth as she kissed him again._

_He smiled, kissed her, rested his forehead against hers, eyes closed and just being. Basking in her, reveling in the fact that he'd finally told her how he felt. "I like being in love with you, too."_

_Because he'd told her how he felt._

"_Sam, I—"and he stopped as he stared at the blue mist that danced between them, making his head ache and the world bend around him. He shook his head, fear knotting in his stomach as he looked around, and the grass flickered fro a moment. Concrete? The grass was concrete?_

_He opened his mouth to ask Sam if she knew what was happening, but instead he said, "I swear, they plan these things. Let me take care of this, I'll be right back. Don't… don't change your mind, okay?"_

"_I'll be right back," he said again, looking around again. "I'll be right back," and when he turned back to Sam she was gone._

"_Sam?" he called, getting up and turning around, looking for her. "Sam? Where are you? Where are you?"_

Danny shot upright in his bed, chest heaving and sweat making his skin slick. The dream danced in the back of his mind as he struggled to come fully out of it, to wake up, and he vaguely desired copious amounts of caffeine. But he was in no mood to go and find his family right now. Not a chance.

He some serious planning to do if he was going out convince Sam to have dinner with him. Just him.

_I'm always with you._

He blinked as he pushed his sheets back, hands rubbing up and down his arms as gooseflesh broke out. He looked around, eyeing anything that looked suspicious. But no, his ghost sense would be going off if there was something in his room. Or his house, or even in the neighborhood.

He rubbed a hand across his face, through his hair and looked around once again, unable to shake the feeling that something was very, very wrong. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and stood, taking a step forward to grab clean clothes, and he hit something wet. A towel.

_Flashing red lights._

He stumbled back, panic tearing up in his throat. A towel. They'd gone to the pool last night, hadn't they? Swimming, fooling around. Him and Tucker and Sam. _Sam._ He started shaking his head, backing away from the wet towel like it had suddenly burst into flame that threatened to devour him and everything he held dear.

_Sam._

A kiss. More than one. Tucker leaving and kissing her. The way she felt in his arms, pressed against his body. Soft and smooth and—

"No," he whispered.

He closed his eyes and backed into the bed, the mattress catching him at the back of his knees and he fell back across it, then slid down the other side so that he could huddle against the wall where he couldn't see the towel. The towel—_slung in the back of a police cruiser._

…_if I killed her._

"No," he whimpered and buried his face against his arms, his body trembling as he fought down the memories.

The pool. He'd tried to tell her and… A ghost. There'd been a ghost. He'd come back and found Tucker and Sam, and Tucker was breathing into her mouth, performing CPR, and she'd been standing next to him looking down at her…

"Her body," he breathed. "No…"

"Sam. Sam, please," and he struggled for breath, specks of light dancing at the edges of his vision. "Please, no. No, no, no." He didn't even realize he was screaming until Jazz was there and her eyes were wide with fear as she raced unsteadily across the room.

"Danny, Danny, you have to stop!" she cried as she fell to the floor, a piece of plaster cracking off the wall and breaking across her back. She screamed too, her voice piercing the sudden creaking that filled the room, "Tucker!"

Then Danny was looking up from the floor, blinking and dazed as Tucker hovered over him, concern washing his features as he carefully held an icepack to Danny's cheek. He licked his lips, sat up a little and realized he was lying on the floor in his room. Or what was left of it.

"I guess it was a very localized earthquake," he heard, and recognized Jazz's voice. he pushed himself up, one hand automatically going to the icepack as his jaw worked a little, felling distinctly bruised, and he glanced at Jazz. She was talking to his parents.

An earthquake? He looked around the room better and was surprised to see cracks running up and down the lengths of the wall, plaster missing and smashed across the floor. Cracks bent across his ceiling, and his bookshelf was overturned. His computer monitor was cracked, and he'd be willing to wager that his hard drive was fried.

"What happened?" he asked Tucker quietly, ignoring the pain in his face.

Tucker shook his head. "Wait till she's got them gone, Danny. Just try not to freak out again, okay?"

Danny frowned. Freak out? _Oh._ Freak out.

The door closed and Jazz was kneeling beside him, turquoise eyes guarded but worried. "You were screaming," she said, and he winced. She nodded. "Your wail has gotten a lot stronger. How are you feeling?"

"Tired," he said and rubbed his jaw.

"Sorry," Tucker said. "It was the only thing I could think of."

Danny shrugged. "I… It wasn't a dream, was it?" Tucker shook his head and Jazz's eyes dropped.

Danny turned away, and leaned his head against the wall, pressing his head against it, wondering what would happen if he pressed so hard that his head imploded. Make a mess, probably, and not help anything. Anyone.

"Danny, if you want to talk…" Tucker trailed off as Danny didn't move, and he got up slowly. "I know this is hard for you. It hurts me, too. If you… If you want to talk to me, just call, okay?" Danny nodded without looking at him, and Tucker glanced at Jazz. "I'll come by later. Or tomorrow."

Jazz reached a hand up to him and squeezed his arm fro a moment before letting Tucker go, watching as his head dropped and his shoulders curved downward. He was hurting. Maybe she could recommend a grief counselor. But then, she thought as she turned back to Danny and laid a hand on his back, there really wasn't anyone for either boy to talk to.

The things that had bound them to Sam were far more arcane than most people believed in, and she didn't really want either of them risking their secrets.

"Danny?" she said quietly.

She felt him shaking and she scooted closer, her hand sliding up to his shoulder and then around him so that she was pulling him to her. He was crying, she realized, and wrapped him in a hug. Crying, she realized was an understatement for the uncontrolled sobs her brother was giving in to, and she bit her lip against tears of her own as his arms wrapped around her and his head pressed against her stomach.

"Oh, Danny," she whispered as she stroked his hair, trying to soothe the tears and the pain and knowing that everything she did was… inadequate. "I'm sorry."

His entire body shook as he sobbed against her, and she gave in to her own tears, bending over him and trying desperately not to feel the pain that radiated off of him. His tears were scalding hot against her, and she held him tight, hoping he understood what she couldn't tell him, hoping he knew how much his family loved him, how much she loved him.

Maybe how much had Sam loved him.

As her tears slowed and stopped, Danny's became more controlled, until he was merely lying there with his face turned into her, arms tight at her waist like he was afraid to let go for fear of what would happen if he lost his anchor to his sanity. Maybe just balance, and she stroked a few strands of hair back from his cheek as he finally turned his face to the side.

His eyes were closed, and his face was pale and streaked with tear tracks. "I tried to tell her, Jazz," he whispered hoarsely. "I tried to tell her that I loved her."

"Oh, Danny," was all she could say.

"A ghost came," he said finally. "I told her I'd be right back."

Jazz laid a hand on his cheek, careful as she felt the heat of the bruise Tucker had given him. "You know this wasn't your fault, right? It wasn't yours or Tucker's. It was just a…"

"An accident?" Danny asked bitterly as let go of his sister and sat up, rubbing his cheeks against his shirt.

"No," she said gently. "A tragedy."

"A tragedy. Yeah," he said softly.

Jazz stood, brushing her clothes off and dusting her hair. "When you're ready, we'll be waiting for you, okay?"

"I don't want your pity."

She frowned at him. "It has nothing to do with pity, brother mine," she said as she laid a hand on the doorknob. "We're family. We share things. Love, joy. Grief." She opened the door and stepped through it. "When you're ready, we'll be waiting."


	5. Chapter 5

Beneath the Surface

5

_The power of the halfa's grief was intoxicating._

_The creature lay back, letting it washer over her as she tried to breathe it into her body. She cold only manage the barest bits, but they were… delicious. She would have to have him under her own power before she could take advantage of the power, use it to translate her into immortal. That, though, wasn't going as smoothly as she'd hoped._

_It was an annoyance, to admit that. But she hadn't had a great deal of hope for him turning to her immediately. She had been a tentative try, just as a friend, and had been promptly rebuffed, a fact that made her frown before she carefully schooled the expression away. But there was an easy hope for that._

_He would be most vulnerable after the wake, the funeral. She would take advantage of that and when he was at his weakest she would cast a glamourie over him so that she could begin feeding from him. This, at least, was something the little witch couldn't do anything about, and the creature frowned as she touched the mirror in front of her, letting her own reflection fade and picking up the darker tones of the ghost zone as magic whispered into it._

_Ectoenergy swirled across the face of the mirror and she forced a little more power into it, smiling with pleasure as the image resolved itself into a pale form in scraps of black lying on a rock. The witch, she thought with some malice, was trouble. Her death curse had very nearly been fatal, and had forced an unhappy change to the plan._

_But there she was, safely bound and confined to the ghost zone. Safe, and very weak in her present state. There would be nothing she could do to save the halfa now. Almost all of her power had gone into the thrice damned curse, but the witch could barely cast a coherent thought, much less an actually spell._

_Good, the creature thought as she let the power drain from the mirror back into her. She didn't have time to worry about the witch regaining her powers. After all, she had a funeral to attend._

xXx

It was wrong for the sun to be shining, Danny thought. It galled him that it would be bright and clear skied the day of Sam's funeral. It was just so _wrong_. It should have been dark, dreary and overcast. Maybe even storming. Sam would have liked that, it would have suited her goth image.

The wake had been well attended, according to Tucker. Danny hadn't gone. It had been too… painful. Too much, he admitted silently as people filed from the line of cars to follow the pallbearers and coffin to the gravesite. To where he was sitting, slouched in a chair at the very back of the crowded mass of them, with Tucker.

With Tucker, who understood why Danny hadn't gone to the wake. With Tucker, who had kept Jazz from trying to psychoanalyze him as he… as he dealt with Sam's death.

Tucker had told him the wake was nice. People he didn't know saying all sorts of great things about Sam. People they both doubted actually knew Sam. And Tucker had scandalized the whole affair by speaking for her himself. Even though it hurt, Danny smiled a little. Tucker had taken a page from Sam's book and lectured them on the great waste of the flowers, and had scolded every single person who had attended.

_If you knew Sam, you wouldn't have brought her flowers that are only going to die now. She'd have liked it better if you'd made a donation to her favorite charities. She must be ready to roll over in her grave at all this._

Yes, Sam would have loved that. The great and proper funeral her parents had let someone else plan was disarrayed by the murmurs and mutters after that. He expected some would still be talking about it for days to come, but that was how it went. Sam wouldn't have settled for any less, and she certainly wouldn't have kept quiet herself.

Danny had always figured she'd scandalize his own funeral if he died before her. It was only right that someone do it for hers.

The flowers had been brought, they surrounded the gravesite. Masses and masses of them, with far too many pink flowers. Those would be from people who had never known Sam at all. Her parents' friends, people she had known in passing. They were generic arrangements with predetermined design and labor and cost. They were ugly.

The coffin was slid onto the webbing over the hole that had been dug. It was a pearly white with gold handles. At least there was a faint tinge of purple-blue to it, he thought as the ranks of chairs began to fill. People dressed ion dark colors, and Danny glanced down at his own somber black suit. He hadn't worn a suit since he'd graduated high school.

The seat to his left filled, and he looked back up to see his father sitting next to him. Past Jack was his mother, his sister. The fiancé, too, who'd flown in to support Jazz and meet the entire family. That meant Danny, he frowned. Because according to his mother Ryan had spent Christmas with the Fenton's.

Silence reigned for a moment, and Danny looked to the front. Sam's parents were sitting there. Her father sitting up straight as steel, like he had a rod shoved up his backside holding him there. Her mother was leaning into her husband, and Danny could hear her sniffles from where he sat so far behind them. Both in black, and Sam's mom even had a hat with black mesh draped carefully across her face.

The priest that had been arranged for was standing up, now, next to the coffin, and Danny's gaze slid away to look at the spray of flowers lying on top of it. Purple and white flowers, and he closed his eyes with a sigh. That had been the only thing he'd actually done in the three days since Sam had died. The only thing he'd actually given a damn about.

He'd gone head to head with Sam's mother for that in a shouting match that had ended with the poor woman in tears and Danny struggling to control his raging green eyes before he started frying anything in sight with ectoblasts. She'd wanted pink, yellow and white, had been obsessed with the idea of roses and gladioli, with a few carnations tossed in for tradition.

Tucker had come to Danny after he'd heard about that. On accident, Tucker had been at Sam's house to pick up a few things that Sam's mother couldn't ever see, and came under the pretense of bringing a casserole his mother had made. He'd left almost as quickly as he'd gone and told Danny that they had to do something. The offer to order that one particular arrangement had been made and refused, and Danny had completely blown up, demanding the woman for once let her daughter have something that would be Sam, and not what she wanted Sam to be.

The result was… Sam, he thought with a sigh as a breeze ruffled at the flower petals. Mrs. Manson had gotten white. But Danny had demanded that the masses of roses get nixed. Lilies were better, much better. There were lilacs and iris' and a handful of tiny cream rosebuds scattered through. It was beautiful, and he wondered if maybe Sam would know how much he'd put into it, so that it would be perfect for her.

He grunted faintly. Perfect for her. Perfect would be Sam sitting next to him, not in a box in front of him, ready to be lowered into the ground.

"The lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down…"

Danny let his mind drift as the man began to speak, his bible held in his hands like it was a talisman against the pain of death. Sam had not been Christian. She had not been Catholic or Jewish or any religion that had believed in God. Sam had been an atheist, and would probably be very annoyed that her mother had insisted on a religious service.

He smiled faintly at the sudden urge to stand up yelling, "Free the frogs!" or some such nonsense. She'd've loved that. Sam would've died laughing. He frowned at the quick pain in his heart. Right. She was already dead, and he glanced up as a shadow suddenly passed over his face.

It was Mrs. Manson, and he looked around, confused. People were drifting away, back to the long line of cars pulled haphazardly onto the grass at the edges of the cemetery lane. It was over. He'd spaced out so completely that it was over, the finals words said, and it was _over_. There were only a handful of people left near the grave. Tucker, Jazz. Mrs. Manson, where she looked at him through he black veil, eyes red and more tired than they should have bee. And Mr. Manson. She was leaning against him, like standing was too much for her.

They'd lost their only daughter, he thought.

"They were lovely. You were right, Sam would have liked them very much," she said softly, her voice strained, and it took Danny a moment to understand that she was talking about the flowers. The flowers he had fought so hard for…

He nodded, stood up and tucked his hands in his pockets. "I just wanted her to be happy," he said, feeling foolish. He'd never gotten along very well with Sam's parents; they'd always looked at him like he had grown a second head or something. It probably came from his parents and their obsession with ghosts.

He figured he'd only made it that much worse when he'd gotten into the fight with Mrs. Manson over the flowers, and he must look so insane to want Sam to be happy at her own funeral. She was dead. Dead. She couldn't see the flowers. She couldn't see anything. Danny's eyes burned and he swallowed trying to keep the tears inside.

"I know that," Mrs. Manson said and pulled away from her husband and folding Danny into a surprising hug. "I know that, Danny. She could have done much worse than you," she said as she let him go, leaving Danny to stare at her bewildered.

"Let's go home," Mr. Manson murmured to his wife, and she nodded, letting him turn her towards the waiting limo.

"I'd say that was creepy," Tucker started as he came up behind Danny, who was staring after the Manson's. "She called me yesterday to thank me for always being Sam's friend."

Danny nodded. "Mom said she called me, too."

Tucker clapped a hand to Danny's shoulder. "How're you holding up?"

"I've been better," he said with a strained smile. "I miss her."

"We all do," Tucker said as the moved from the row of chairs. He followed Danny as he walked to the coffin, Jazz trailing at a discreet distance. "It is nice, you know."

Danny nodded. "She would have liked it, right?" he asked as a hand trialed along the smooth lines of the coffin. He reached up to the spray of flowers and plucked one out, a purple iris, and then one of the heavy white calla lilies. "She would have really liked it, right?" he asked again as he clutched the two flowers in his hands.

"She would have," Tucker said as Danny closed his eyes.

"Team Phantom," Danny said as he opened his blue eyes again, staring at the coffin, trying not to notice the gaping hole underneath, or the poorly disguised mound of dirt ten feet behind it.

"Team Phantom," Tucker echoed. He laughed a little, and Danny looked over at him. "I was thinking that we should set Delilah free again. For old times sake."

Danny smiled. "She'd get a kick out of that."

"Jazz told me what happened after I left you guys in the pool," Tucker said, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. "I, uh, didn't have a reason to leave the pool that night. I just wanted to give you two some alone time."

Blue eyes met dull green, and Danny reached out to his best friend, grabbing him by the shoulder and squeezing firmly. "This wasn't your fault. I know Jazz can be a pain, but she's pretty smart. This wasn't your fault."

Tucker sighed. "I know. Logically. I just feel so…"

"Guilty?" Danny offered. "I know how you feel."

The tearing despair, the guilt that ate through him. Oh yes, he did know how Tucker felt. And it wasn't Tucker's fault at all. No, Tucker had left first. Danny… he had left second, and no matter how many times Jazz said otherwise—which was going on about a gazillion, he thought—he couldn't shake the overwhelming belief that if he hadn't gone after the ghost, if he hadn't left her alone… That Sam would still be alive.

Tucker sighed, grabbed Danny's hand where it held his shoulder and squeezed. "We should go. Your parents are waiting. Your mom is pretty worried."

Danny nodded. "I know." He smiled a little as they started walking towards Jazz, collecting her and heading to the only remaining cars: the RV, Jazz's pink bug and Tucker's black Toyota. "Hey Tucker?"

Tucker paused behind the open door of his car.

"You should come over later," Danny called with a wistful smile. "So we can free Delilah."

xXx

No matter how many times she had been in the Ghost Zone before, it was still one of the strangest and creepiest places Sam had ever been. And she was goth, so that was saying a lot. It also didn't help that she was trapped in the corner she was currently inhabiting. After hours of painful attempts, she still hadn't managed to breach the barrier around her.

It made her wonder exactly what she was doing there, and what she was.

She dropped down to the rock with a frustrated groan, her arms curling around her legs and her injured ankle tucked up on top of the sound one. It was, she understood, a conundrum. She was a ghost, or she wasn't, and as best she could tell… she was.

Of course she was bleeding red. And she was hungry and cold. And she certainly wasn't exhibiting any ghost powers that she'd ever seen. Not even the faintest hint of invisibility or intangibility. But then, she could also remember dying. Drowning. And vividly at that.

Yes, it was an enigma wrapped in a mystery, and she bit back the frustrated laugh that had her eyes tearing. An enigma wrapped in a mystery. Danny would never know how his and Tucker's obsession with superhero movies had rubbed off on her. How sad.

She stood up again, hands running over her bare stomach and Sam wished, just for a moment, that if she was going to spend the rest of eternity in the Ghost Zone, that she'd died in something a little less revealing. Granted, the look on Danny's face when he'd seen the scraps of black held together by tiny strings, it had been worth it.

But somehow that was cold comfort as she froze. Literally, almost. Her fingers and toes ached with the cold and she again wondered if she was alive or dead.

She'd seen him. Holding her. She had to be dead.

"Oh god," she whispered and sank back to her knees, huddling over her legs and clutching at herself as she cried.

The memory wouldn't leave, and how she's managed it… She was dead. And she wasn't moving on, was she? It made sense. She had died, hadn't been ready to die, had even been murdered, she admitted, and was now trapped because she wasn't ready to move on. She had, what did everyone call it?

Unfinished business.

"Oh, Danny," she sighed as she rubbed the heels of her hands against her eyes, trying to force the tears back inside. They wouldn't help her, but it certainly wasn't hurting her. Especially since she couldn't stop. Not yet at least. Not with everything she had seen.

It had been like a vivid nightmare when she'd first woke up in the Ghost Zone, but after a bit it had actually dawned on her that it wasn't just a bad dream. Or even a dream at all. The aching wound on her ankle proved that it had been real. It still bled, even days later.

At least, she thought it was days. She hadn't really found a way to track time since she'd woke up. It didn't even seem to matter anymore. At least she wasn't dealing with the all consuming obsession that drove the ghosts she'd seen so far, Danny not being an exception. Whether or not he realized it, his hero complex i _was_ /i his obsession. Unable to turn away from doing the right thing. Most times.

Sometimes he could, but that was usually when it involved schoolwork in high school.

Maybe that was why he had told Tucker to stop, even as she stood there and begged Tucker to keep going. Because he knew she was dead, was gone, was beyond any help that either of them could give her. She had to have been, though it confused her why Danny could see her and Tucker couldn't.

Maybe because she was a new ghost. Maybe she hadn't even been a ghost yet. Just a soul, Sam thought and looked at her hands and then down at the rest of her body. Maybe she wasn't a ghost yet. Maybe she was a soul still, in need of guidance. More like she was turning into a ghost.

"This sucks," she muttered as she looked around her again, seeing nothing new, nothing changed, just endless rocks and green and violet swirls of ectoenergy. Far too much of it, and despite having spent a great deal of their high school years mapping out the Ghost Zone, Sam still couldn't figure out where she was exactly.

She sighed. None of them had thought they'd even come close to finding all of the secrets of the Ghost Zone. But she'd hoped, she'd so hoped, that she could at least figure out where she was. If she was even close to any of the ghosts they'd fought over the years… That would have been bad.

She was defenseless here. A soul or a baby ghost, whichever. They'd have torn her apart before she'd come to, and then it really wouldn't have mattered. Her hopes for having been near the Fenton Portal died a similar pragmatic death as she realized being so close to it would be begging for anyone to rip her from her afterlife.

After all, wasn't it the most highly used escape route from the Ghost Zone in existence?

Sam sighed, laughed, and realized this was an even more interesting turn of events. She certainly wasn't thinking like a human right now. She had been for a few minutes, but now she was thinking like a… Well, more like a ghost than she had been. Or maybe she was just in shock. If ghosts could get shock. She was, though, turning rather blue around the edges from the cold.

She bit her lip and tried to concentrate, searching for the power inside her that allowed her to use magic. She'd searched for it several times since waking up, but there hadn't been much of anything. It had been the dimmest flicker inside her, and now it wasn't much better. It did seem to grow a little stronger the more time passed, but as it was she couldn't count on it being useful for very long.

Her eyes blinked open, lavender dark and surprised. Was that her ghost power? Her mage talents bleeding over? They _were_ getting stronger. She closed her eyes again and reached, taking hold of it with sure mental hands and weaving it into a small but warm fire in front of her, huddling close without opening her eyes. And if she could do this, what else could she do? The thought gave her some relief, and she settled into the warmth.

xXx

Delilah loose had been entertaining, to say the least. Not that she'd caused any trouble. Well, not too much. There was only so much she could do while carting along her infant.

Danny Phantom was quite accurately blamed, since he hadn't exactly tried for discretion. It was more along the lines of tribute, and he'd taped the news when the story had aired, making sure to break the tab from the video tape so that it couldn't be recorded over before dropping it into his desk drawer and swearing he'd watch it every year on the day she died.

And if only two people in the entire town of Amity Park knew exactly what it was all about, neither cared.

She had died a week ago. Been buried four days ago. He almost felt like he was ready to face the world. His family he'd already faced, the morning after he had walked away from her grave. His friend… There was the so familiar guilt left over from that. He had been neglecting Charlie, and he had been the one to invite her to come to Amity.

Because she had no family to go home to, and he wasn't doing much better at giving her a fun summer. She understood. He knew that from what she had tried to say to him when he'd gotten back from the funeral, her pretty blue eyes shining with tears as she tried to tell him how sorry she was. He'd smiled, nodded, and then hid in his room to try and cry himself dry.

He knew he hadn't managed that. No, he hadn't, and if his pillow had acquired a certain salty dampness to it before he fell asleep each night since her death, well, he couldn't be blamed.

Today though, he was reemerging. Sam would have kicked him from Amity Park back to California with her steel toed boots if he kept sulking. Maybe not if he continued neglecting Charlie, she'd been too jealous without even realizing there was no chance for another girl in his heart as long as she was there.

He smiled faintly at that as he ran his comb through his hair. She'd appreciate that, he thought. If she knew. As long as she was in his heart, he was hers. Not as long as she was alive. As long as she was there. it worked for him, and he grabbed his shirt from his bed and tugged it on, rolling his eyes as it mussed his hair again, but he didn't stop to fix it. He had better things to do.

Like eating breakfast, and head for the water park.

He slid around the corner into the kitchen and a table full of edible food, his mother and sister both sporting aprons and talking animatedly as they worked at the stove and sink. He revised his opinion of edible as he grabbed the empty chair next to Tucker and leaned close.

"Is it safe?" he asked, pointing at the mostly eaten food on Tucker's plate.

"Perfectly," he answered. "Morning, Charlie," he called past Danny as Charlie came blinking and yawning into the kitchen, sinking into the chair next to Danny and smiling blearily around.

She yawned again. "Morning, Tucker. Danny. Everyone."

"Didn't sleep?" Danny asked as he took one of the empty plates and began filling it, then dug in, expecting to find that he was being taken over from the inside out by ectoplasm infused food, and delighted when Tucker's assessment was correct. It was great food and perfectly safe to eat.

A shadow crossed Danny's face as he remembered doing almost this very same thing a week before, only with Sam there. He'd eaten cereal instead of the non-vegetarian fare, and his stomach turned. He pushed the plate away and frowned as he got up and grabbed a cereal box from in the cabinet, a bowl and a spoon, before settling back to the table and fixing himself a bowl.

"Um," Charlie started but stopped when Tucker shook his head. It didn't pass her notice that Jazz and Maddie shared a knowing look, and she sighed at the pitying glance Danny's mother gave him as he resolutely crunched into his cereal.

Breakfast became a more than silent affair after Danny stopped eating what had been cooked, and he couldn't help but notice it, hurrying and automatically washing bowl and spoon before retreating to his room again. He knew it for retreat, and tried to cover the fact by retrieving his wallet and the sun block he'd left on his dresser, before heading back down to meet Tucker and Charlie, who were both waiting on the front stoop.

Charlie had managed to change in the short time he'd been upstairs, and he was surprised to see her wearing her bathing suit already. Sam had always changed once they got there, if only to force them into renting a locker, but Charlie looked more than prepared to hit the water as was, wearing a silvery blue one piece and dull green board shorts.

"Sorry," Danny said as they followed Tucker into his car, and Tucker shrugged.

"Used to it, dude."

"Yeah," Danny said. "I still didn't mean to keep you guys waiting."

The day was hot and sticky, perfect weather for hours in the middle of a fairly popular water park, and passed much more quickly than Danny had expected. Sometime between the first trip down the high slide and the wave pool he started to think about things other than Sam. And between the wave pool and the lazy river—a truly odd piece of work that was, at its most basic level, nothing more than a concrete stream winding its way through the park for people to float around in—he stopped thinking about her all together.

And between the lazy river and the corkscrew slide he had somehow managed to forget exactly why he'd been so upset that morning, because Charlie was so much fun, and hadn't he just known that she and Tucker would get along great?

But the ride home was a different story. Huddled alone in the backseat, damp hair straggled across his face, eyes closed and nothing more than the radio playing, he realized that the day had passed without Sam. And even worse, that he hadn't really thought about her at all. That he had forgotten her, on some terribly basic and intrinsic level, but still he had forgotten her.

That knowledge hit him a lot harder than he wanted to admit, putting him in a fairly terrible mood by the time Tucker was dropping him and Charlie back off at Fenton Works. For Tucker's part he recognized the familiar scowl and Danny's face and only quirked an eyebrow up, frowning at Danny's harsh nod but only returning it and putting the car into gear, heading off down the street to his own house.

There would be hell in Anita Park tonight. Danny Fenton was in a terrible mood, and what Fenton felt, Phantom dished out.

Silently Danny slipped past Charlie to the front door, tugging his key out from the chain he wore it on around his neck and lifting it completely over his head to slide it into the lock and turn it, the tumblers clicking and the knob turning. He walked in and Charlie followed, his family calling greeting that he semi grunted at and then took the stairs two at a time.

"Oh, it was marvelous," he heard Charlie saying from below. "I've never been to one before and—Danny! Wait, I forgot something," and he heard her following him up the stairs.

He paused at his door, hand on knob, door half open, wet towel clenched in his fist like if he squeezed hard enough he might break it. Charlie came to a sliding stop in front of him, smiling up at him wildly. Without warning she leaned up on her toes and planted a kiss on his mouth, making his eyes go very wide and Danny stepped back suddenly, his back hitting the door as she continued on to her own door.

She was almost through it when she paused, looked back at him and said, "Thank you for a great day."

Then she was inside her room, the door closed, and Danny was standing in his doorway staring after her, his hand still clutching his own doorknob, the other touching his lips like he had been burned.


	6. Chapter 6

Beneath the Surface

6

_He was a fool._

_A pitiful, miserable little fool. Enough grief to feed a thousand of her sisters, and she had only managed to sink one conduit into him at that. It was enough for now, she contemplated silently. The witch was dead and buried, had been for a week. It was understandable that he was resisting anyone's advances._

_But he shouldn't have been able to resist her as well he had; he must be stronger than she had believed. Which would work out better for her. The more power he had, the more she would have after she took it all and gained immortality. And that was what it was about. Not that he, a mere man, had denied her. Not that he, a love lost mortal, had managed to wrap another woman so deeply inside his heart that she couldn't drink anymore of his wonderful emotion that she already was._

_Those could be overcome. Continual exposure, and he would become hers eventually. Even the witch couldn't stop her now. No, it was only a matter of time until he was hers, mind, body and soul._

"_But I'll have to step up the plan a little more," she said into the silence as she rolled over onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. "I'll need to bring him to my bed before the moon wanes."_

_That gave her a little more than two weeks. Two weeks would be plenty of time to seduce a virgin to her bed, and she laughed softly at that. The power would be multiplied threefold by that fact alone. Perhaps she could seek the witch out in the Ghost Zone and thank her._

_After all, it wasn't every day that a descendant of Lilith was given a virgin male to feast upon._

xXx

The sky was cloudy as Danny made his way across the sky, spoiling for a fight and unable to bring himself to search for one. Charlie had kissed him. A week after Sam had died, she had kissed him. And he had… Liked it, he though faintly as he angled down to the ground, his speed turning him into a faint black and white blur before he pulled up abruptly, the wind of his passage flattening the grass at his feet, rustling the flowers wildly.

Her grave.

The stone was up but then, he knew it would be. Her parents wouldn't have wasted any time in making sure that she had the best of everything, even in death. A dark gray-black granite with silvery veins running through it. It was nice. Beautiful, even, he admitted silently as he reached out a gloved hand to touch the top of it.

Lightning streaked across the sky above him, thunder cracking and rumbling until the ground was set to sway beneath him. The storm he had wanted so desperately to attend her funeral had finally shown up; the first rain since before she had died. The sky lit again and Danny turned his face up, waiting for the sky to open over him.

He wasn't disappointed, and the rain fell heavily, lighting continuing its arcing dance above him as the heavens echoed with rage. It was devastating, deadly, fascinating in its terrible beauty. It should have been like this when she was buried.

It should have been like this when she died. She wouldn't have died then; they wouldn't have been at the pool swimming.

Another light lit the sky, and this time he opened his eyes to it, green glittering in the moist air, and they narrowed into slits as he realized the newest round of lightning wasn't lightning at all. A ghost. A ghost who was flying to the cemetery, a ghost who was flying toward him, and he closed his eyes, dropped his head down as his jaw set and his shoulders tensed.

With a cry he pushed off of the ground, barreling up into the ghost, yet another one of Vlad's pitiful attempts at subduing him, and it screamed in rage as his arms went around it, his back arched and turned his head to the sky flight into a death plunge to the ground. Danny's body lit up with green power, radiating out and searing at the skin of the ghost he was clinging to, dragging down to the ground and making a crater in the road with it.

He'd aimed for outside the plots, he ruined the lane that ran less than thirty feet from Sam's grave, and his eyes began to glow more brightly as his fist tried to make a new hole in the ghosts face, only succeeding in drawing green blood and a whimpering scream from the ghost as it tried to fight back ineffectively.

"You wanted a fight," Danny growled as he tossed the ghost back up into the air, following like death as it took off into the sky. "You have one," he screamed, flying faster, rain streaming into his face, masking it with white locks that stuck to his skin and iced over from the altitude.

"Please!" the ghost screamed as Danny shot an ectoblast at it, and part of its leg was singed off in one great smoking mass.

It dropped down, frantically waving its arms at Danny and he held his white gloved hands up, both dancing in towers of green ectoenergy, and backlighting his face until all that could be seen was dancing shadows and fiery green eyes as he bared his teeth at the creature. Lightening danced across the sky again, close enough for Danny to feel it crackling along his body from the residual static in the air, and the bared teeth took on a predatory glint.

"Leave," he ordered sharply, voice echoing behind thunder. "Leave now. Don't come back. Never come back here, or I'll kill you."

"You can't—" and the ghosts stuttering denial was cut off by another aimed green charge at its arm.

"Get out of here!" Danny roared, his entire body gleaming with power.

The ghost fled past him and he buried his face in his hands, fought to control the rage. He could feel it licking across him, even through the hazmat, and shuddered as he consciously exerted control over it, dampened it down into a barely perceptible glow, then managed to make it die all together as he dropped back toward the ground.

What the explanation would be if anyone had seen him, he didn't know. He hoped no one had, that it hadn't been caught on tape, that it wasn't going to make the front page in the morning. All he needed was for Tucker to find out that Danny's powers were vacillating out of control while his emotions were merrily wreaking havoc through him.

Better to hope no one saw.

He dropped back down to the ground in front of the headstone and sank to his knees, eyes staring blindly ahead of him as he read what it said. _Sam Manson, Beloved Daughter, Treasured Friend._ The dates which he let his eyes slide over, not wanting to see how little time she'd had, and they returned to her name, to her status as beloved daughter.

Just beloved, he thought almost desperately as he reached a hand out and pressed it over her name, head bowed as the tears came again. Beloved, and missed, and god! Why couldn't he have had a little more time? Why couldn't he have told her sooner? Why couldn't he have just… Just…

He bit his lip as he realized he was starting to babble out loud.

"This isn't healthy," he said as he looked up again, closing his eyes against the stinging rain that plastered his jumpsuit against him, slicked his hair back from where it had been straggling in his eyes. "I'm a ghost, in a graveyard, talking to a headstone."

He laughed.

"You'd appreciate the irony, wouldn't you, Sam?" He dropped his hand from the cold stone, letting himself sit back on the soggy ground, legs crossed and propping his elbows up on his knees so that he could drop his chin into his hands, staring at the headstone like it might talk back.

"I think I'm going insane," he started. "I'd swear I saw you the night you died. I know I did, but Tucker didn't. Then I dreamt about you. I can't get you out of my head. I miss you so much. I… I wish I could see you again. I thought about trying to find you in the Ghost Zone, but I think that'd be stupid of me. It's so much bigger than what we managed to map all those years ago. The odds of me finding you aren't good."

He sighed, sat back p and ran a hand over his face, water clinging to the glove and his lashes as he looked back at the stone. "You'd have an easier time finding me, I think. But it's cruel to think that you'd be there. I'd rather think of you as having already moved on. No loose ends, nothing to make you cling to this world. I want you happy."

He stood, then knelt back down, a hand smoothing across the inches and inches of empty space beneath the inscription her parents had wanted. A faint smile curved his lips, decidedly sad, and his eyes flashed a little brighter as one finger glowed brightly and bit into the granite of the headstone, making it hiss and melt and mold under his touch.

When he was done the rain was hitting hot stone, making it steam as he smoothed an ectopowered hand across it to rub out any rough spots. And when the stone was smooth and cool he stared at it with more happiness than he'd had for anything since he'd kissed her minutes before she died. There, carved into her headstone as a permanent reminder to the world, was the stylized D and P that she had designed as his trademark, his logo.

His symbol, that was now hers.

"Team Phantom," he whispered as he pressed a kiss to the top of the cold headstone and stood, turning and then jumping back in startlement and near fright as he realized he wasn't alone. A pale gleam not five feet away, solidifying as he watched but still trapped in the shadows of the night as clouds covered the moon.

He held a hand out, lit it up green and gaped. "Sam?" he gasped as he took a step forward.

She smiled at him, took a step forward and stopped with a pained expression. Her mouth opened, she was talking to him, trying to ask him or tell him something, and Danny blinked as he realized that whatever was so important wasn't meant to be heard.

"Sam, I can't hear you. I can't understand you," he whispered as he came closer, one hand reaching out and sliding through the filmy form she inhabited. "Sam, what's wrong?"

Her face was falling apart, hazy tears clouding her eyes and running down her cheeks as rain dripped through her, and he reached out again trying to grab hold of her. "Sam!" he cried as she began to fade and the scatter. She only shook her head and reached a hand out to him as she disappeared from sight altogether.

Green fire flared up around him, scorching the earth as he stared at the emptiness where she had been moments before, and he threw his head back and screamed. "Sam!"

xXx

If it was possible, Danny was more tired when he woke up than when he went to bed. Sure, he'd only crawled between the sheets at three, and had begged fro sleep to come for maybe another hour. But here it was going on noon and he felt like hadn't slept at all. He was _dragging_. And it was noticeable, he decided as Jazz, the only person in the house besides him at the moment, shot him a wide eyed stare.

"Are you okay?" she asked. "I know you didn't get in until late. Was it a bad fight?"

He scowled at her as he stuck his head in the fridge and dug around until he found something that didn't fight back. Dragging it out he found a fork and dropped into a chair at the table, flipping the lid off of the container and identifying it as… Well, edible. Very edible, and he shoveled it in cold.

"You're keeping tabs on me?" he asked around a mouthful, and Jazz arched an eyebrow.

"When haven't I?"

He swallowed and stole her glass of soda. "I'm nineteen. Not nine. Not fourteen, either, and I've been taking care of myself for two years now," and he shoved another bite into his mouth before he said something really nasty.

Jazz sighed. "I can't help worrying about you. You're my favorite brother."

"I'm your only brother," he mumbled and applied himself to his food, not coming back up for air until the container and Jazz's soda were long gone, pleasant memories related to a full and happy stomach. He sat back, eyes closed, hands resting and said happy stomach, and pleasant thoughts of attacking the slice of chocolate cake in the fridge dancing in his head.

"Is he always this oblivious when he's eating?" Danny's eyes shot open as he saw Charlie sitting next to his sister, a glass of water in front of her and an amused smile on her face.

"Oh, no," Jazz said as she grabbed her glass back. "He's always oblivious. Period."

"Hey!" he said indignantly. "I am not. And I'm a growing boy."

Jazz snorted and turned to Charlie as she poured herself more soda. "Did you have a nice walk?"

"The park was amazing," Charlie said with a wide smile. "It's so pretty here. I wonder that it's not more advertised as a vacation spot."

Jazz promptly started choking on her drink as Danny let out gales of laughter. He wiped an eye that was tearing up at the thought of the Brady Bunch trying to spend quality time in Amity Park. "There're ghosts, hostile invasions on an almost regular basis. And you want it to be a vacation spot."

"What's wrong with that? You've told me all about this Danny Phantom ghost who protects everyone."

Jazz chuckled. "Not everyone sees Phantom that way. And besides, not everyone wants to vacation with ghosts."

"Oh, you'd be surprised. There's a big market right now for exotic vacations." Charlie took a sip of water. "I can see a ghost town being attractive to people with money to spend on stupid things."

Danny thought for a second. "Okay, you have a point. But I'd still rather keep Amity as home. Not a tourist destination."

Charlie shrugged. "Well, I'm sort of a tourist." She flipped a smile at Danny that caught his breath in his throat, and he swallowed unconsciously trying to clear it. "You can be my tour guide. Show me what goes on in Amity Park, okay?"

"Yeah," he said faintly. He blinked blindly as a memory of vivid lilac eyes shifted and swirled lazily into blue, and then the sensation was gone and he was smiling widely at Charlie and Jazz. "Yeah, sure. There's tons of things to do around here that don't involve ghosts. Hopefully," he added thoughtfully.

Jazz shot him an odd look but he ignored it as he dumped his empty container and fork into the sink. He paused for a moment, checking his pockets to make sure he had his wallet, clapping a hand to his chest as he checked to make sure his key was still there. "Okay, got everything."

"Want my car?" Jazz asked, not sure whether she wanted him to say yes or no.

But he shook his head. "Nope, going to do it the old fashioned way. You see more on foot, too."

"Really?" Charlie asked as she followed him out the front door. "What is there to see?"

"Oh, lots of things. Nothing like the bigger cities," he said as he absently hooked an arm around her shoulders, not seeing the pleased smile she tried to hide. "You've been to the water park. There's the bowling alley, miniature golf, and a couple of other things. Nothing really interesting."

"Well, I'm sure you'll keep me from being bored," was all Charlie said as she walked alongside him.

"How do you feel about roller coasters?" Danny asked as he glanced down at her, his eyes oddly dulled.

Charlie smiled up at him. I think they're absolutely the greatest thing known to man. Why?"

"There's a cool amusement park type thing out at the pier. It's a bit of a walk," he added as he turned them down a different street. "But it's a lot of fun."

He frowned. He hadn't been there more than a few times after the incident with Technus and the Fenton Ghost Catcher, and all of them with… That was odd, he thought. Who had he gone with? He blinked, rubbed a hand over his eyes as the beginnings of a headache began twitching behind his eyes. Who had he gone with?

Tucker. He sighed. He'd gone with Tucker, and it's been the day he was Fenton and Phantom, so there'd been three of them. He frowned again, the ache getting worse. That didn't seem right, somehow. Three of them. There'd been three. Tucker, Fenton, Phantom. That was three.

"I'm ready for some fun," said a voice next to him, and Danny blinked several times as it pierced through his clouded thoughts.

He smiled at Charlie like it was the most natural thing in the world. "Fun is good."

And if Danny thought it strange that most of the day was spent with him trying to figure out exactly what was wrong inside his head, he didn't mention it. Besides, between the food, the rollercoaster and the Ferris wheel, it was a full afternoon, even without ghosts springing up. That, he decided with a frown, was an understatement.

There had been one ghost. The Box Ghost. Who had tried to take over the boxes behind the concessions. Danny had redirected him to the empty lobster traps beneath the pier, piled haphazardly high, saying they were boxes. Just boxes with ventilation.

He laughed as Charlie readjusted the giant pink bear, pushing the memories trying to taunt him, and then grabbing the bear from her as she grumbled at him.

"You're all heart, Fenton. I carried that damned thing most of the way back," she muttered as she let him take it.

Danny tucked the bear under his arm, pushing his hair out of his eyes and glancing up at the setting sun. "I could have missed the last time and gotten you the blue alligator."

She shrugged. "Oddly colored stuffed animals. They're all the same," but she took the bite out of it with a smile. "I like it. I do, Danny. Thanks for winning it for me."

They stopped in front of his house as he lifted the key and chain from around his neck, unlocking the door and letting them in. "Mom? Dad?" They prowled into the kitchen with a minor detour for Danny to drop the bear on the couch.

"Gone to dinner with Jazz and Ryan, be back by ten," he read as he yanked the note down from the front of the fridge, scowling.

Charlie shoved him out of the way with her hip, opening it and pulling out a jug of fruit juice and leftover pizza. "You're too hard on him," she said knowingly as she poured a glass and grabbed up a cold slice. "He's not a bad guy."

"Jazz has terrible taste in boyfriends," Danny said as he snatched a slice for himself and munched on it as he picked through the other pieces of paper on the fridge. A grocery list, a schedule for a ghost hunting convention in October. A note from Tucker.

_I stopped by, Jazz said you had already gone out with Charlie. Call me._

He crumpled it in his hand and dropped it into the garbage as he finished the pizza and washed his hands. He was tired. More than tired, and he rubbed still damp hands across his eyes, willing them to want to stay open. Then he sighed as he glanced at the clock. It wasn't even eight, and he was ready to turn in.

"Charlie?" he asked as he turned around, leaning back against the counter. "I'm pretty beat. I think I'm going to go ahead to bed. Do you mind?"

"Not really," she said as she took her glass to the sink, then put the rest of the pizza and juice in the fridge. "I think I'll turn in myself."

They walked up the stairs, almost touching, and Danny followed her to the closed door of the guest room silently. She turned back to him as she opened the door and paused. "I'm really glad you asked me to come to Amity Park, Danny."

He smiled, a hand coming up to touch her short blond hair, tugging at a few strands before dropping his hand back down with a faint frown on his face. "I'm glad I asked you to come, too."

He started to walk away, to head back to his room, but he stopped before he could and, without thinking, leaned down a little bit and pressed his lips to Charlie's. She tasted sweet, like candy, and he saw the faintest flash of lavender behind closed eyes as he straightened after a moment. His tongue flicked across his lips, picking up the traces of sweetness, and he decided it must be her lip gloss.

"I really am I glad I asked," he said quietly at her surprised expression, then turned and walked to his room, closing the door firmly behind him and hearing the echo of hers closing moments later.

He leaned his head against the cool wood for a moment before turning and stripping his shirt off as he headed for his bed. Pants followed to a pile on the floor, and he dropped down on to the bed with a grunt as his head hit something hard. Danny frowned as he sat back up and moved the pillow to the side, eyes fixing on a familiar golden red sphere.

The amber globe he'd given Sam.

The amber globe he'd searched her room for the day after the funeral and found under her own pillow. The amber globe that she'd loved so much. He rubbed the back of his hand across his moth, sick to his stomach that he'd spent the afternoon struggling to remember her.

There had been three. Tucker, Danny and _Sam_. Not Phantom, he'd been doing his own thing up until he'd saved 'fun Danny' from the fall out of the Specter Speeder. Sam, who he'd completely forgotten when he moved on a bare week after her death to kissing another girl, a friend, his roommate.

He closed his eyes and dropped the globe blindly onto his nightstand, burying his head into the pillow and willing for his body to relax, his mind to stop thinking so that he could just sleep. Whether or not he wanted to, he needed to. He needed to forget it all. His eyes slipped closed on that thought, so alien to him that it jarred him into a completely defenseless state against the weariness that overtook him

xXx

"Jack, I'm worried about Danny."

"What's to worry about?" Jack asked as he followed his wife into the silent house. It was dark, everyone had already gone to bed. Except for Jazz, he frowned. She had opted to stay with her fiancé.

A nice boy, really, Jack decided as he creaked up the stairs behind Maddie, habitually tiptoeing against the bulk of his body. It was the third time he'd met Ryan, and so far he hadn't seen anything to object to. He wasn't a ghost, he was on his way to a successful career as a pediatrician, and he didn't call him 'Pops.'

And he didn't mind that Jazz wanted to stay a Fenton. Of course, she was planning on hyphenating her name. But everything would still say Fenton. And first, too.

"Jack," Maddie said quietly, getting his attention as she looked through Danny's door at the figure huddled into his bed. The sheets had been kicked down to the bottom and Maddie stepped silently through the room, avoiding the pile of clothes at the foot of his bed out of years of habit, and grabbing the sheet up from where it was tangled.

She straightened it and lifted it over her only son's sleeping form, tucking it p over his shoulders and brushing at the mop of messy black hair that was his inheritance from his father. He muttered something that she couldn't hear and shifted, making Maddie tense as she thought he would wake up.

He didn't, and she sighed, a pained look on her face as he turned his face towards the door to let the light fall on it. He was so pale. There were circles under his eyes, and he didn't even seem to really lose the pain, not even while he slept. She could see it in the furrows on his brow, the way his entire face seemed tense as his eyes danced beneath closed lids to whatever dream—nightmare—he was having.

She shook her head and pressed a kiss to his forehead, hoping that whatever he was dreaming would become something happier as she went back to the door and her waiting husband, closing it firmly behind her and slipping her small hand into Jack's much larger one.

Even after twenty-five years of marriage, she was still amazed at how lucky she'd been to get such a wonderful husband. A little ghost crazy (to the exclusion of everything else) sometimes, but then, so was she.

"He doesn't seem to be taking it very well," knowing that he would understand what she didn't give voice to.

Jack sighed, his massive shoulders heaving up and down as he followed her into their room and closed the door. "He needs time, honey."

"Jazz thinks he's avoiding it. Maybe even suppressing it," she answered back as they changed into their nightclothes. "She thinks he's making it worse."

"He just needs time, Maddie," Jack said again. "Have I told you how much I love you today?"

She smiled at the sudden change of subject. "Not in the last hour, dear."

"I love you, baby," he said as he wrapped thick arms around her and lifted her up. And when he saw the worry still on her face he said, "It'll get better. If it doesn't, Jazz can talk to him."

"I know," was all she said.


	7. Chapter 7

Beneath the Surface

7

_It was, she decided, proceeding beyond expectations. The creature had thought that it would be harder to pierce the veil of the halfa's grief, even with her particular brand of magic. Who would have thought? It made him even more vulnerable, even with the flickers within him that things were not quite right._

_She'd seen him trying to fight through it, seen him trying to understand it. The confusion that didn't ever seem to leave him when she exerted herself._

_And she'd seen it all slip away as she wrapped him in the power. She had siphoned so very much when he'd kissed her, and he hadn't even noticed. The inevitable release of the spells had been combated by his utter, utter weariness. There wasn't anything extra for him right now beyond that grief and the lust she had finally set to smoldering inside him._

_Oh yes. It was coming along quite well. It wouldn't be very much longer until she would possess him completely. And when that happened, she would live forever._

xXx

Everything that Sam Manson had understood to be true about the Ghost Zone was proving incorrect. The longer she was trapped in her tiny corner, the more she wondered if her understanding, and Danny and Tucker's by association, was wrong. Because she wasn't functioning like any of the ghosts they had come up against.

True, none of those ghosts were recent casualties of life. Most of them had been dead for years, and several longer. And some weren't even deceased humans, but other beings that Sam had only read about.

But she was human. She was recently dead. And that was completely incompatible with blood, hunger and cold.

She sighed and laid back down on her rock, doing her best to huddle underneath the scrap of blanket that had appeared once when she'd woken up. Another thing that made her wonder about the recently dead. She'd woken up numerous times to things like that. Supplies of sorts, food, water, the blanket. Her ankle had been treated, though almost haphazardly. As if whomever tended it didn't really give a damn one way or another.

Which only proved her theory that she was recently dead and the care given to her was because of her residual humanity.

But some of it was more clear. After the initial few days had passed, the fear, the depression, the pain and anger, she'd been able to think much more clearly. It made Sam wonder if her new state of mind was because she was progressing into the possessive and obsessive ghost nature. Maybe losing her humanity. But she never thought about if for too long because if she dwelled, her humanity reared its head and sent her into circling it like a dog worrying a bone.

With a sigh that ended on a wispy trail of breath Sam sat up, stood, wrapped her blanket around herself tightly as she paced the rock from end to end, side to side. It was exactly twenty-three steps long, fourteen wide. Hardly bigger than her room was, when she thought about it. Her room had at least had a door that she could come and go through as she willed.

Here, she was trapped.

"God, I wish I knew what was going on." She frowned, pushed a few strands of hair from her face and looked around worriedly. "Well, too bad Desiree isn't around when you can actually use her." A pause. "Of course, she'd probably flub that one up somehow. On purpose, of course."

"I hate this!" she screamed into the silence of the Ghost Zone, hands clenched on the blanket and then let go suddenly, allowing it flutter down to the ground as her hands began to sting with uncontrolled power.

She'd been attracting it, she thought. Residual magic around her, floating through the Ghost Zone. It had been useful to collect it, use it for fires, to create water to clean herself and her worthless bikini, to try and project herself to Danny again. She'd done it twice so far, three if she counted the time just after she died. She'd managed to find him once while he was sleeping. That had been days ago, and she'd only managed to stay for a few seconds before she'd lost it.

She'd spent hours unconscious that time, and it had been nearly as bad the next time she'd tried. She'd found him at the cemetery, she could only assume that he'd been visiting her grave. She'd had almost a minute that time, and he'd looked so startled, almost scared at first. And then so very sad. She had cried for hours when she'd woke up after that try.

It hadn't been worth the effort that time. She'd hurt him, made it worse. And she hadn't even been able to tell him she was in the Ghost Zone, beg him to find her and help from whatever limbo she'd been trapped in. if he could even help her. She smiled a bit. Danny Phantom had always been able to help. He'd always beaten the bad guys.

Sam closed her eyes and let her mind drift down low enough into her consciousness that she could begin to detach herself from her body. It was an odd thing. One moment she was there, eyes closed, breathing steadily (and how did she breathe if she was a ghost?) and feeling the cold as it seeped into her skin, through her veins and muscles and into her bones. The next she wasn't feeling anything and, in fact, was staring down at her body where it stood, still as death.

She shuddered at the comparison and began to think about Danny. The way he looked, his bright blue eyes, dark, dark hair. The tilt of his jaw when he was stubborn, the way he smiled crookedly when he was trying to get out of trouble. When she'd built him inside her mind she began to let herself remember the things she tried to forget.

His smell, his taste, his touch. The way his voice had sounded when he said her name last, when he'd told her that she was his type, not Charlie. All of the little things that made him Danny Fenton, Danny Phantom, and no one else. It was working much as it had before, and she watched as she began to drift, trying to find some familiar landmark before she was out of the ghost zone altogether.

The astral projection wasn't exactly something she understood, and she was disappointed when she slipped out of the ghost zone not very far away from where she'd been trapped, her body still standing where she'd left it. She felt dizzy by the time she began to form together in the material world, and she blinked rapidly, wondering if she was actually blinking or if it was a figment of her imagination.

A room. Danny's room. And dark outside, too. It was the middle of the night and the lump in Danny's bed was him, sleeping. She sighed, passed a hand across her face in frustration, then realized that it was cruel of her to want him to be awake. If he saw her again it would hurt him, and she didn't want to hurt him. So it was better this way. Much better.

She took hesitant steps toward him, eyes going wide as she realized she was walking several feet above the actual floor, and then realizing that it didn't matter. It really was just a figment. The whole projection was nothing more than an elaborate self image she was supplying her mind as it traveled outside of her body. It was sill tot be frightened at walking on thin air when, in essence, she wasn't really even there.

Sam laughed quietly and reached a hand out to Danny, recalling that his had passed right through her that night at the graveyard. His hand, the rain. Everything physical had gone right through her as if she weren't even there. Because she wasn't. She was dead and she was letting her mind walk among the living.

It went through his shoulder, and she bit her lip, frowning bitterly. She had hoped. She had so hoped. Then she was arching back from the bed in terror as light cut through the darkness, spilled i _through_ /i her. "Jack," she heard from the door and squinted her eyes as she recognized Danny's parents, and his mother crossing the floor and neatly sidestepping the clothes dropped at the foot of his bed.

Maddie scooped up his sheet from where it was tangled at the foot of Danny's bed, tugged it over Danny's body, and pushed hair out of his face. Then Danny moved and Sam moved a little closer, wondering if he'd wake up and see her. But that might not be so good, she realized and began to let herself go a little looser in her consciousness. If he saw her while his parents were around it could cause real problems for Danny, and Sam wouldn't have any part of causing him trouble.

But he didn't wake even as his mother kissed his forehead, and Sam drew more heavily on the power she hadn't used yet to stay with him for a bit longer. She ignored Maddie as she walked to the door, eyes only for Danny as she looked at him in the light. He looked so terrible. Tired, pale.

It broke Sam's heart and she brought herself down a little closer as the door closed firmly. "Oh, Danny," she whispered and tried to touch him again, wanting to cry as her hand slipped back through him. She couldn't touch him at all, and she darted up and away from him, moving her consciousness to the far side of the room so that she wouldn't be tempted to touch him again.

He moved again under the blankets, and this time the flicker her mind gave her was from the pervading weariness that was beginning to slip through her. She was running out of power, using up what she'd gathered far too quickly. But she had to say goodbye. She didn't know when she'd be able to try again. Sam didn't even know if she wanted to.

"Danny," she said as she came closer, hesitant to go too near while he was moving so restlessly. A dream. A nightmare, more likely as she caught a grimace on his face in the dim light from the window. A nightmare that he couldn't escape, and she bent down low to press an intangible kiss to his lips before she let go completely and went back to her prison in the ghost zone.

"Sam," he whispered clearly, and she jerked back, thinking that he could see her. But no, Danny was still asleep.

His face scrunched up again and he curled over onto his side, the blanket kicked away again, and this time she could see his face clearly as a cloud moved from in front of the mostly full moon, letting a glowing white late filter in. his cheeks were wet, he was frowning, furrows etched into his forehead. "Sam," he said again. "I'm sorry."

Whatever had made her walk two feet above the floor abruptly died and she collapsed against it like she was real, her hand touching the bed and her eyes flying open widely as she realized she was _touching_ it. She was touching it, and nothing else mattered. Until she heard Danny's voice again, much softer than before, and her eyes flew to his face to see it scrunched up painfully, almost like he was trying not to cry.

"Please, Sam, I love you," he said quietly, and the shock was enough to break her control on the now tenuous thread of power that was allowing her to stay by his side.

She was thrown back into her body, knocked physically to the ground from the backlash of the out of control magic. And through it all his voice was echoing in her head. _Sam, I love you._ It was still there as the last of her energy failed her and she slipped into unconsciousness.

xXx

Danny woke to repeated thumping against the side of his bed and the annoyingly regular feeling of being thumped into his headboard. He cracked his eyes, glaring at the intruder as he identified Jazz. "Go away," he mumbled as he pulled his pillow back over his head. "Trying to sleep."

"Danny, it's two in the afternoon."

He jerked upright. "Two?" He flew out of his bed, grabbing at clothes and growling in frustration when he realized they were the ones he'd worn yesterday, then digging into his bags—he still hadn't unpacked them—for clean clothes. Those in hand he began hunting for his towel, rushing around Jazz as she stared at him, a smile on her face and obviously wanting to laugh.

"It's not funny," he muttered as he looked under his bed for the towel he knew he'd had the day before.

"Sure it is. You come home and immediately start keeping nocturnal hours." She pointed to the hook on the back of his door, and he snatched the towel off of it.

"I went to sleep before nine," he said, smirking at her surprised stare as he ducked out of the room and into the bathroom.

Twenty minutes, all of the hot water, and a bar of soap later he emerged feeling more human. Maybe not completely rested, or even totally awake, but human. At least as human as he could be since he was, technically, half dead. He was still rubbing his hair when he heard knocking on the front door, ignoring it as he finger combed his messy black locks and poked at the circles under his eyes.

"Should not be there," he said with a frown and sighed when he realized he'd put his shirt on backwards. He'd just finished turning it around when he heard more knocking, this time at his door, and glanced back to see Tucker standing in the doorway, a large book under one arm.

"Hey Tuck, what's up?"

Tucker walked in quietly, staring at Danny curiously. "You look like hell, Danny. Problems last night?"

Danny frowned again that Tucker had noticed how tired he still felt. And looked, he admitted with a final glance back at the mirror. Wasn't like he could hide it. Or maybe he could, and Danny popped a knuckle while he thought about it. Jazz had all of her makeup in the bathroom, and their skin was pretty much the same color, wasn't it? Maybe a little foundation…

He nearly laughed when he realized he was contemplating putting makeup on to hide the circles, and he shook his head at Tucker. "Nothing more than normal," he temporized, neither admitting nor denying.

Tucker pulled Danny's computer chair out, rolling it over to the window before leaning back into it as Danny straightened his bed up without explaining what exactly normal was. It didn't escape Tucker's eyes that the sheet had been kicked straight onto the floor, the blanket nowhere to be found since it was summer. And before Danny flicked the bottom sheet smooth Tucker saw the telltale wrinkles that showed Danny hadn't slept well.

When Danny was done and finally sitting back on the bed, Tucker finally held up the book he'd brought. The scrap book Sam had put together, had used to show Danny and him that they were friends when she'd wished their first year of high school that she had never met Danny. It'd been useful then, and might be useful now.

Tucker didn't need it, he didn't even want it. He had all sorts of files on his PDA, saved pictures of various blushy moments, ghost fighting and the general fun they'd had as kids. No, he didn't need the scrap book. Not like he thought Danny might need it, and he laid it on his lap so that Danny could get a better look at it.

"Is that…?" Danny started, and Tucker nodded, then glared as a faint tapping came from the still open door.

Charlie. And despite his many encouraging attempts to get Sam to accept the girl, or at least be civil to her, Tucker was ready to happily throw her out the window as she walked right in with a smile for Danny. He was ready to toss Danny out along with her when Danny's attention promptly zeroed in on Charlie, a stupid grin on his face and a well remembered lovesick look that made Tucker frown and narrow his eyes.

_This is not right,_ he thought for a moment before clearing his throat.

"Danny?" he said, holding the book up as Danny's head swiveled back to him. "I thought you might want this. Maybe we could look through it?"

Danny shrugged, tossing another stupid smile at Charlie and making Tucker want to chew on his beret. "Maybe later, okay? I was going to take Charlie out, show her some more of the town."

Dismissed, just like that. Tucker fumed as he stood, tucking the book angrily under his arm and stomping past Danny to the door. He glanced back one more time, and the anger melted away at the smug smile Charlie was turning Danny, completely oblivious to Tucker watching as she leaned forward and kissed him.

_And he let her._

The anger welled back up and the door slammed behind Tucker as he moved out of the house like a man possessed, leaving Danny to Charlie and her kisses and touches and every other damnable thing that Danny shouldn't have been doing with her. He'd played oblivious so well with Sam, maybe that was all he was good for.

And oblivious was exactly what Danny was, never noticing slamming doors, angry footsteps, and suddenly absent best friends as his attention completely refocused on Charlie the moment she entered the room. It was like he'd been swimming through mud trying to function until she appeared, and immediately he felt more awake, more alive as she sat down next to him.

Danny couldn't take his eyes off of her, and when she kissed him he felt like the world was maybe exploding around him. The colors were brighter, the blue of her yes, the red of her lips, the gold of her hair. So soft, too, and Danny sank his fingers into it as he pulled her closer, firmly ignoring any protests that were trying to rear up inside him.

There wasn't anything wrong with kissing Charlie, with touching her. With making her sigh and whimper as his fingers danced nimbly across her skin. Danny closed his eyes as she clambered on top of his lap, pushing him back on the bed and then pressing her mouth to his, lip gloss making his lips slick as she kissed him.

There absolutely wasn't anything wrong with this, he told himself as he let his hands come up and hold her slender waist.

_Then why does it feel so wrong?_

Danny pushed it away, trying to concentrate on the girl who was currently straddling him, not trying to figure out why he suddenly wasn't into it at all. He was nineteen, for heaven's sake. He was a ball of raging hormones, he should want nothing more than to have a beautiful girl on him, under him, wherever he could get her.

_Then why do you feel like what you're doing isn't right?_

Stubbornly he pushed back at the voice, willing it to shut up and was rewarded by the beginnings of a stabbing headache right behind his eyes. He winced, blinked a few times as he tried to concentrate on Charlie, on her lips, her legs, the way her skin felt beneath his hands— And it refused to stay silent, making his head throb in time with his pulse as he determinedly closed his eyes and threaded his hands through her short hair, pulling her down and kissing her.

And murmuring, "Sam," as he saw vivid amethyst blazing behind his closed lids.

His entire body went terribly still as he realized what he said, realized who was on top of him, kissing him, and he gently pushed her back with an apologetic stare. "I'm sorry," he said softly. "I can't do this."

She smiled at him gently, sliding off of him, off of the bed, and nodding as she walked to the door as if nothing were wrong. "It's alright, Danny. I understand."

Danny's headache became infinitely worse as she smiled at him, and he was reminded of an animal baring its teeth in warning, in threat. He shook his head, buried it in his hands as the door closed. His temples were tender as he pressed careful fingers to them and rubbed slowly, gently, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened.

He sighed when the headache didn't even begin to abate, then got up, dug in the drawer of his desk and pulled out a bottle of aspirin. Thumbing the lid off he shook four into his palm, dry swallowing them with a grimace at the taste but not wanting to leave the confines of his room for even a quick mouthful of water from the bathroom sink.

He couldn't face Charlie right now. Not after what had happened.

_God_, he thought as he turned to stare at himself in the mirror, the circles looking even darker than they had before. _How can I even face myself?_

He scrubbed a hand over his face and changed to ghost, shooting up through the ceiling and hanging above the op-center for a long moment weightless. What he needed was a distraction. What he needed was a fight. He flew off to find a ghost who'd made it out of the Ghost Zone.

xXx

Charlie stared at red crescents embedded in her palms, bloody wounds where her nails had dug in and pierced her flesh as she glared at the wall. Behind it was Daniel Fenton, the biggest raging hormone she had ever met, and the most stubborn male. He was resisting the spells, the magic. He was still using free will when she was exerting herself to seduce him.

That wasn't right.

She kicked out at the side of the bed and cursed as she bruised a toe, then dropped down on the mattress, swiping a pink tongue across the wounds and smiling as they disappeared with the blood. Then frowned.

He should be under her complete control. That was the point of the mission. To have the halfa under her control, to do with him as she wished. To successfully seduce him and drink away his power. Until he was dead. Fully dead, and not this half ghost abomination that he was. So young, so naïve. So very powerful.

It certainly didn't hurt that he was than passably attractive, and despite his current resistance he was easily manipulated.

"Stupid, foolish, child!" she spat as she reached out to him with careful magic. It was designed to steal his energy, his power. To make her stronger, give her more.

And she cursed again when she realized he wasn't in his room. He wasn't even in the damned house. _Thrice damned creature,_ she thought viciously as she reached further, trying to pinpoint where he was, trying to steal a little more of him so that he would be easier to seduce the next time. After all the trouble she'd gone through she certainly wasn't about to let him walk away because he'd fought back.

She laughed, even as she realized he was too far away for her to find him with her current low level connection. He'd fought back, yes. But he didn't even know what he was fighting against, much less who. It was pitiful, really. The brains of the outfit were defiantly not Danny Phantom. No, the brains of the outfit were dead or alienated.

It was good practice to exploit the enemies weaknesses. Or in this case, the victim.

She closed her eyes, calmed herself, then found her small carry on and dug through it producing a slim book that looked centuries old. She opened it, leafed carefully to a brittle, yellowing page more than halfway through, and skimmed a finger down the foreign script. Charlie pursed her lips as she read, brow furrowing before she smoothed it with a conscious reminder never to scowl again.

It created unsightly wrinkles, and she intended to keep her flawless skin for as long as she could. Longer if at all possible.

She closed the book carefully, replacing it in the bag and zipping it closed before tucked the bag back behind her larger suitcase. It certainly wouldn't do for anyone to come in with the well meant intention of straightening up and have them stumble across that little gem. Especially since it wasn't even written in a human language. She smirked. Not even in a humanoid language, like elvish or mermish.

No, this was written in a completely different language, just as the book wasn't actually made from leather and wood pulp paper. Oh, no. it was bound in leather, yes. But the pages were carefully pressed sheets most closely resembling papyrus, made from the hair of a woman who had defied God himself so that she might go her own way and not be a slave to any man.

Lilith. The mother of demons.

Seduction was bound into the very core of that book, and it could tell her what she needed to know.

She sighed happily as she laid back. Oh yes, and the mother of demons knew exactly how to sway a man's charms to a woman. "And for that I shall need to create more bounds between us," Charlie said softly to the ceiling.

Not many, she decided. Two, maybe three, and all at a deeper level than the lonely one between them was currently at. Deep enough that she could steal his power, his life. Deep enough that he couldn't function with her close to him without her say so. Deep enough that he wouldn't dare call her by another name.

Deep enough that he wouldn't _ever_ call her 'Sam' again.

Just a little later, she decided, and closed her eyes with a silent laugh. And once she had it done, there was nothing stopping her from taking everything that she wanted from that idiot boy. Not his power, not his life. And perhaps, not even his heart. Soon, it would all be hers if she so desired.


	8. Chapter 8

Beneath the Surface

8

_It wasn't possible._

_Even with a second and a third conduit she was still touching barely more than she had before. He was a fool. A powerful fool who could still unwittingly resist. Which should not have been possible in the least. And yet he had escaped her for one, not even two, but three entire days. Three days in which she had been forced to endure his family in an effort to make her efforts worthwhile._

_They weren't, and she cursed furiously as he eyes lit on a temporary power source. With the halfa resisting her so well she needed to recharge, as it were. She was going through far more power in her attempts at seducing him than she was draining in return. She needed more to win him over and bed him._

_The fool in front of her would be a perfect a target and would never be missed, no matter how much he screamed as she ruthlessly drank in his life. Better, she decided as she abandoned the body and stretched lithely, reminding herself of the large cats she had seen when she'd managed a trip to the zoo sans his parents. Predatory, hungry._

_Hunter, all of them._

_She closed her eyes and reached out through the three channels between them and pushed, trying to force them wider, trying to do more than brush at the tantalizing power locked inside the young halfa's body. Trying to do anything but managing only small teasing tastes that left her frowning and wanting more, and wanting it now._

"_No wonder he's so talked about," she said softly. "Young, attractive, and powerful enough that he cold rule both of his worlds."_

_And yet… He didn't. Because he was good, and she scowled at that. Well, it was time for him to not be so good. Perhaps that was why her seduction was going unrewarded. He was untried, knew nothing about the pleasures of a woman's body. A smile spread across the creature's face as she contemplated her new idea, the thought that had taken root inside her twisted mind._

_Perhaps then, corruption should precede corruption. Because once the seeds of darkness were planted, it was so much easier to bend someone's will. And maybe once he knew what they could be capable of together, he might even walk willingly in to his own destruction for the sake of a few moments' pleasure._

xXx

"Is he here?" Tucker asked darkly when Jazz answered the door. Under normal circumstances he would have used his own key, but given Danny's strange behavior and the way he was willing to forget Sam so quickly, blow Tucker off for his new squeeze… It just didn't feel right.

But Jazz looked just as upset as Tucker was, and he frowned as she stepped aside and let him come in. "I don't know if he's going to talk to you, Tuck," she warned quietly. At the raised eyebrow she shrugged. "He's locked himself up in his room. No one's seen him in days and I'm pretty sure he's using his powers to avoid everyone."

"That's just not right," Tucker sighed. "Will your parents get too angry if I break his door down?"

She chuckled a little, some of the tension draining away. "Mom might. Dad's already been up there a couple times aiming to do just that."

"I'll deal with him," Tucker finally said determinedly as he headed up the stairs, the box he was carrying underneath his arm. He didn't even knock, he only put his hand to the knob and whispered a quiet incantation and smiled as there was a click and the door slid open.

Danny's room was like a cave. Dark, possibly dank except that he didn't think Danny could stoop to that level of slovenliness. All things considered, his room was still fairly neat. Just dark, and mostly empty. For a few moments Tucker thought that maybe the halfa had used his powers to run from the inevitable confrontation, or if maybe he had just gone invisible.

But no, there was a lump curled up underneath piles of blankets on the bed. It was Danny, and Tucker closed the door firmly behind him before going over to the bed and putting a foot to the lump. And shoving. Hard. There was a mutter, a grunt as Danny hit the floor, and a very rumpled head finally peeked out to stare at Tucker with shadowed eyes.

"You're worrying your family, ignoring your friends, and completely being an ass to your guest," Tucker said before Danny could tell him to leave.

There was no response, only a rustling as Danny sank back down beneath the blankets and ignored his best friend. Tucker sighed and dropped the box on the bed. Danny needed something more than just being shoved off the bed. He didn't know what it was, but he was sure as hell going to try and find out. It was the least he could do, Tucker thought as he dropped down next to Danny and tugged at blankets until he had finally found a head.

"Danny."

"What?"

It was something. Not the response he'd been hoping for, but it was definitely something. "I know you're still upset, but you do have people you can talk to."

Danny shook his head. "I don't feel like talking."

"Too bad," Tucker said shortly. "I'm sick of this, of the way you've been acting. Suck it up, man. She's dead. She's not coming back, and all you're doing is making everyone who loves you scared out of their minds that you're going to do something stupid."

"I'm not going to kill myself, Tucker," Danny finally said quietly.

"Then get up off the floor."

Danny sighed and finally pushed himself up to a sitting position, groaning before pulling himself back up to his bed. "I'm up. Can't a guy get some rest?"

Tucker ignored the question as he took a good luck at his best friend, then reached out and flipped the lamp on Danny's nightstand on so that he could get a clearer look. Well, he wasn't wasting away, but there was reason to worry, he decided. His hair was messy, but that was normal. His eyes were definitely sunken in, circles like bruises shadowed underneath. That wasn't normal, but maybe Danny had a point about wanting rest. He certainly looked like he needed it.

The real kicked was the angry red wound that peeked out from underneath the shirt that Danny wore. Inches of it slipping up over the collar of the shirt, enough to worry Tucker and make him wonder what exactly had tried to take Danny's head off. Without a warning, without a word, without even a thought Tucker reached out and snatched the collar of the shirt down to see crusted scab, flecks of dried blood along it. Patches where blood still tried to seep a little.

"What the fuck?" he asked.

Danny pulled away, jerking his shirt from Tucker's hands. "Run in with a ghost."

"Dude, it looks like he was trying to kill you." When Danny looked away, a hand trailing down his throat faintly outlining what had looked to be the deepest end, Tucker narrowed his eyes. "Or maybe you were letting someone try to kill you."

Uncertainly, Danny looked back to Tucker and met angry green eyes. "Passive suicide," he finally said, soft enough that Tucker had to strain to hear him.

"Danny," Tucker started, terribly worried and more than a little afraid as he reached out a hand to grab his friend's shoulder. But Danny stopped him with a quick shake of his head.

"I'm not going to kill myself. I'm not going to let anyone else kill me, either." Danny's tone was firm, sure, and the sudden fear of losing his remaining best friend began to dissipate. "I'm not ready to die."

Tucker didn't say anything for a long time. It was hard to hear Danny's admission that he had contemplated it, even tried to end the pain, end his life. If it wasn't slitting his wrists, it was still enough that he'd let someone make shish kebob out of him, and Tucker finally sighed. "You'd better let me take a look at that."

Danny shrugged. "Lock the door," he said as he rolled his shoulders and pulled is shirt off as Tucker did as he asked.

The shirt had hidden the worst of it, Tucker decided as he got a good look at the mass of wounds on Danny's upper body. Mostly they were concentrated across his back, and Tucker realized that they were defensive wounds. Like Danny had tried, then changed his mind. Which was exactly what had happened. Tucker silently dug under Danny's bed for the box of medical supplies that they'd always left there. _Just in case,_ Sam had always said. Well, it was the case now.

"Next time you have the urge to be beaten to a pulp, let me know and I'll do it for you," Tucker muttered as he went about the business of patching Danny up.

"I'll keep that in mind," was the only response he got, and there was nothing but silence, the sound of paper ripping, gaze being unrolled, tape being torn or cut.

When he was Danny was covered in odd patches of lumpy white, but it was worth it to not have to see the actual wounds. There was still the concern over the slicing cut along his neck that went down past his collarbone, but it would be alright with a little time, and mostly some of Danny's improved healing abilities. That was one of the terribly good things about Danny's ghost powers. The wounds he received healed much more quickly than they should have. A trade off of sorts, like the powers that be were trying to say, "We stole your youth, your childhood, thrust this burden upon you, but at least you'll live through just about anything."

So maybe it was a piss poor trade in the end.

Tucker only sighed as he reached behind him and grabbed the box he'd brought and pushed it at Danny. "Mrs. Manson wanted you to have this stuff." He smiled a little, shadowed but still there as he added, "Some of it I liberated so that she wouldn't find it."

And as Danny opened the box he closed his eyes on the sudden pain that welled inside him. So she wouldn't find it indeed, and he reached out a hand to lift the book of his past exploits, complete with pictures, carefully written pages stuck inside. Sam's keepsake of Team Phantom. It caught Danny's heart, made it stutter in his chest, and he bit his lips as he forced his eyes open, willed them to stop burning.

"She wouldn't have wanted anyone to see it," he murmured as he flipped it open.

The photos, the very handwriting was enough to make him close it again. It was too soon, he knew, to look at that particular book. Anything but that, and he dropped it next to him on his pillow and reached in to see what else Mrs. Manson had sent to him. There were plenty of pictures, some framed, most of them not. The ones that weren't were familiar and dog eared. Danny had last seen them stuck underneath the frame of her dresser mirror, a border of memories around it.

They laughed as Danny pointed out the picture of Tucker in freshman year, dressed as Sam. That had been the day that the Circus Gothika had come to Amity Park. He smiled faintly. He'd done some bad things while Freakshow had been in town, but somehow it just didn't seem as bad when he looked at Tucker in a dress. Complete with make-up.

"How'd you know how to put lipstick on so well?" Danny asked, hiding a grin.

Tucker only punched him in the shoulder, eliciting a groan from Danny as Tucker's fist found a bruise. "Alright, sorry I asked. But you looked great in the skirt."

"I'm going to hurt you when you're healed."

Danny shrugged as he dug out another picture. "That'll be tomorrow or the day after. I look forward to it." He stopped and shoved another picture at Tucker. "Look at this one."

"You overshadowed me for that one," Tucker said.

"Hey, she wanted to go to the ball." Danny laughed. It was a picture of Tucker dancing with Dora the princess, taken after he'd danced with Sam. They'd talked the DJ into playing one more and Sam had distracted Tucker so that Danny could hop inside and take him for a spin.

"She looked great, you know?" Tucker said as he smudged a finger over a corner of the photo, the corner where there was a fuzzy image of Sam in the dress she'd been complaining about until Tucker (with Danny behind the wheel) had asked her to go with him. As friends, of course. Even back then he'd known, everyone had known, that Sam and Danny were one of those meant to be's.

Tucker thought it might have been a mistake to point that out, but despite the sorrow evident on Danny's face, he thought it was alright. "She did," Danny said quietly as he reached over to his nightstand and opened the drawer, pulling out a small box and taking the lid of to show Tucker a pile of other photos. Most of them had Sam and Tucker, but there were a few of just Sam.

On the very top was one of Sam taken that night. Just her, with a distinctly love struck Danny behind her watching her where she couldn't see him.

"I stole it out from under the yearbook's nose," Danny said with a faint chuckle.

"Danny, everyone already knew. Who cares if they added it to the yearbook?" Tucker asked as he took the photo and looked at it more closely.

"I stole it for me, not so they couldn't put it in," Danny admitted. "She looked really great. I can make you a copy, if you want," he offered, and Tucker nodded.

"I'd like that. I'd like that a lot."

Tucker handed the picture back to Danny, who laid it back inside the box of his own keepsakes. It very nearly made it back to the drawer before it was spilling across the floor, the box of things from Sam's mother following it and scattering haphazardly as Danny jumped up, whispering, "Oh my god."

If he thought he was in any danger, Tucker might have done something. But even without looking around he already knew that there weren't any ghosts around. There wasn't anything, on any level. Visual or magical, and Tucker frowned as he looked at Danny who was standing tensely next to him, mementos strewn and Danny's moth gaping open as he tried to find words.

"Don't you see her?" Danny exclaimed as he took three steps forward and stopped, his hands reaching out into thin air and his face dropping as he didn't touch whatever he'd seen.

"See who?" Tucker asked carefully as he stood and followed Danny.

"Sam!" Danny exclaimed. "She's here, she's right here!"

"Danny, there's no one there," Tucker said softly. Blazing green eyes glanced back at him, and Tucker read the beginnings of hysteria on the halfa's face. "Sam isn't there," he said again.

xXx

Something was seriously not right, and Tucker was determined to get to the bottom of it. Danny's behavior over the last weeks had been mostly odd, but some of it was understandable. The desire to avoid everyone, to hide away. To grieve alone. That fit very well with the Danny Fenton that Tucker knew. In fact, that was what he had expected. Jazz, too, and why they hadn't been surprised when that's what had happened. Worried, but not surprised.

But the sudden change around Charlie, especially after Danny had told so much to Tucker… Something wasn't right.

He'd been Danny at the funeral. Before the funeral, and often enough since that he didn't think Jazz had really noticed. Of course, Jazz hadn't been around as much, not with Ryan and the impending wedding. They'd pushed it back. Danny didn't know, but Ryan had confessed it to Tucker. He'd found Jazz in hysterical tears.

She was taking Sam's death pretty hard, too. If tucker hadn't known before that, he'd been extra careful around her since then. Some of it, a great deal even, was simply because Sam had been much like a younger sister for Jazz. Albeit a younger, goth, just doesn't happen to live here sister. He chuckled as he pulled into his driveway. Sure, she hadn't lived at the Fenton's. But they'd both been there often enough that they had their own keys.

He had his own key. Sam didn't anymore.

His parents weren't home, a thing he was eternally grateful for. They were still at work and wouldn't be home for hours yet. It gave him plenty of time to try and figure out exactly what was going on with Danny. And Charlie. Sam's concern about her under the true sight spell was heavy in his mind.

But mostly Danny, Tucker thought as he climbed the stairs to his room, making sure to lock the door behind him before dropping his keys and PDA on the desk and booting his computer up while he dug in his closet for a locked box that he dragged out and dropped on his bed with a grunt. If the answer couldn't be found within it, or even hinted at, then he'd have to go with a theory he really didn't want to think too much about.

That Danny had gone over the edge and his mind… His mind wasn't stable anymore.

It was plausible, Tucker knew. More than plausible, since Danny as absolutely convinced that Sam had been standing in his room for more than half an hour. Tucker had checked, first with his own eyes, and then with magic. There was nothing there. Not even a trace of an illusion spell, not even the barest hint of a glamour.

Tucker reached for his keys and unlocked the trunk, running a finger across the lock after he'd twisted the key and whispering a word of unlocking. The trunk's lock popped out after that, and he flipped the lid back. There were books. Books on books, and a few padded vials of things that he and Sam had sometimes used when they were experimenting with new spells or rituals.

Never potions, not Tucker. That had been Sam's department, and all of her supplies were currently under lock and key in New York. That was a relief, he hadn't had to try and find a place to hide those particular things. Some of them would have been hard to explain. Most impossible. And he couldn't just ditch them like he wanted to. They were valuable and hard to come by.

He had no doubts that if he tossed them, Sam would find her way from wherever she had moved on to and haunt him until his dying day.

The first thing Tucker pulled out was a thin handwritten book that he'd gotten from one of Sam's goth bookstores. A good find, a basic spell book that was a fairly good beginner's guide to all things paranormal and mystical. If there was a basic thing to think of, it would be in there.

There had to be something. Anything. Tucker began to get desperate as his skimming hit the halfway point, and quickly passed it. There had to be a reason for Danny being so strange. He couldn't really just have come unhinged. That wasn't possible. It wasn't even fair. After everything that Danny had been through, all the times he'd saved the people, the town, on a few occasions the entire mortal coil…

It just wouldn't be _fair_ for him to lose his mind.

But there was nothing, and Tucker grabbed another book at random, then another and another. In a last desperate attempt he tugged out the notebook he and Sam had started when they'd talked Danny into the ritual that unlocked their abilities and began leafing through it. His green eyes lit up when he found what he was looking for, a cobbled together spell he and Sam had used hundreds of times in high school to cut down on research time. For school or ghost fighting, it didn't matter. But it was a tried and true spell. It _worked_.

It had to work now, and Tucker breathed a prayer as he whispered the spell, setting the parameters to the contents of his magical library, deliberately confining it to the insides of the lockbox.

And he breathed a fervent thank you as he felt the niggling sensation behind his eyes that meant one of the books had something. It was something Sam had given him, straight from her own collection. It was a thick book, and index of paranormal creatures, and anything that wasn't human. Sort of. It had the more mundane things in it; ghosts, vampires, werewolves. But it did run into what seemed to be reliable information about less common creatures such as banshees, hinds and even a several pages long rambling on nagas.

Not that he was ever going to find one of those. They were reported to be native to India and highly reclusive.

But it was in there, and as he flipped pages he groaned in frustration. The section on vampires was what had been noted, and Tucker struggled against the urge to throw the book across the room. That wouldn't help anything, not at all. He just sighed and started to close the book before he realized that it wasn't the entire section, per say, that was being brought to his attention.

No, it was a short paragraph at the very bottom of the last page.

_A smaller subspecies of vampire are known as psychovores. These creatures are known for draining the energy of their victim to sustain themselves, often to the point of exhaustion and, in certain cases, death. The symptoms are characteristically found as mood swings, extreme exhaustion, and is often misdiagnosed by medical professionals as depression. Common species of psychovores include lamia's, belili, rusalka and succubi._

It wasn't much, Tucker thought grimly. But it was a start.

xXx

She needed more energy, and she wasn't going to wait for Danny to come to her this time. No, this time Charlie was going to him, and she was going to turn on the charms of her power full force. She wanted, _needed_ the energy that she was feeding from him. It was practically leaking for anyone who just happened by, and yet she couldn't take anything unless she was in direct physical contact.

It was infuriating. But the fury only made her more ruthless, and Charlie let the sexual glamour flow out from her and towards Danny as she knocked delicately on his door, her face drawn in a pretense of concern. She knew very well that hidden underneath was lust. Hidden even further beneath that was hunger. A hunger that would shortly be assuaged.

He wouldn't be able to deny her this time.

"Danny?" she called softly, and was pleasantly surprised when there was a noise and a light clicked on at his desk, changing the room from a dimly lit place to something more reasonable. He'd been on the internet, not moping about like he'd been trying to do since he'd declined her previous attempts at seducing him.

He was being much more reasonable now, she thought, and slipped into his room with a smile. "I was just seeing how you were. I haven't seen you for a few days. I was worried."

He smiled at her and she began to draw on the links between them, trying to draw his power out without actually having to touch him. The frown that tried to race across her face was ruthlessly shut down before it could even begin to form. He was still protecting himself somehow. It had to be instinctive, something he didn't know he was doing.

Then she did frown, and Danny's looked at her concerned. "I'm alright, I was just…" He shrugged and she schooled the frown away, replacing it with a pleasant smile. "I just didn't want to be around a lot of people right now."

"Any people at all," Charlie offered as her mind turned rapidly.

The only way he could be doing it outside of an instinctive level… He had to really love the little witch. The halfa just wasn't built to be able to raise such powerful mental blocks as he had managed, his ghost powers weren't designed for that. In fact, they were mostly designed for aggressive, offensive things. Which left love as the only other alternative.

A very difficult alternative, and one she would have to work very hard to get around.

"I'm sorry, Charlie. I've been neglecting you." He gave her a rueful smile. "I suck as a host right now, I know."

This time Charlie decided to play coy. Anything to get closer to him and begin to remove some of the very powerful emotions he was feeling as he considered her. The witch was easily under his skin; it was obvious from the shadowed look in his eyes as Charlie moved closer to him.

"I was thinking about what happened the other day," she began and reached a hand out to slide along his shoulder with a faint spark of power leaking from her to him. It returned rapidly as his eyes began to go dull while she drained him. But she needed more, needed it faster.

So she dropped down into his lap with a purr, swiveled so that she was pressed against him and her moth was mere breaths away from his. "I couldn't get it out of my head," she whispered as she kissed Danny, and a dark smile curved her mouth as he responded as expected, willingly letting her set the pace.

She let a moan slip out as his hands moved at her waist, sliding up, and then gripping her at the shoulders. He was falling into place so easily, and she began to widen the drains, trying to take and take and take until nothing was left. If she could manage it now, without even taking him into her bed, it would be even better. She was so wrapped up in what she was doing, in the heat of Danny and his life as she drank it down that when he firmly pushed her away she cold only blink in surprise.

"Charlie," he said softly as his eyes pleaded with her not to be angry. "I'm flattered. Really, I am. But I can't do this with you."

"I… understand," she managed to get out before turning on her heel and locking herself inside the guest room his family had given her for her stay.

She understood, she had said. But she didn't, not really, and her eyes flared golden as she stared at herself in the mirror. What was the problem? She wasn't weak, as her kind went. And her mortal form was attractive—she had made certain that it was when she had acquired it. She was thin, acceptably attractive to every male she had come across, even without using the seduction glamour's.

"Then what is the problem?" she hissed at her reflection.

It didn't answer her, but it didn't need to. She already knew the answer, had stumbled on it moment before she had tossed away the attempted seduction by showing her hand too soon. It was the witch, Sam. The dead and bloody gone witch who was going to haunt her attempts to gain control of the halfa's affections and life. Better that she had slaughtered the little whore when she'd had the chance, instead of going the route she had taken.

Love. True love. It was only her luck that the halfa had found it. Golden eyes narrowed and Charlie bared her teeth. Love was a fleeting thing. She would have to circumvent it. Spells, potions, borrowed magic's. Whatever it took, she would do. Her chance at immortality was more than she was willing to pass up. She would not give in to despair.

No. she would have him, she would have his power.

She would become immortal.

xXx

The number was memorized, set to speed dial on three cell phones, and programmed into his voice relay system on his PC. And still Tucker was concerned somehow he wouldn't get a hold of Danny when he dialed it and sat with the phone ringing impatiently at his ear. He was in front of his computer, a new book that he had liberated from the library spread out on the desk and two web pages pulled up for his reference on his monitor.

"Tuck, it's two in the morning. Tell me you have a reason for this."

Tucker let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding when Danny answered, and he laughed flippantly to cover up his apprehension. "You know you weren't asleep. I saw you flying past ten minutes ago."

Danny chuckled. "Caught me. So what's up?"

"I have some things I want to ask you," Tucker replied. "I want you to answer them, no questions asked, and I'll explain it after I get a grip on what's going on."

He couldn't see Danny, but long association let him know that Danny shrugged as he said, "Sure. Shoot."

He glanced down at the book, then at one of the web pages. "You've been sleeping a lot lately. Are you coming down with something?"

"Not that I know of. I think that the last couple of years are just catching up with me all at once," Danny answered.

"Have you been having weird dreams lately?"

Danny snorted. "Define weird."

"Lots of dreaming about food, eating, things like that," Tucker rattled off as he referred back to the web page.

"Nope," Danny replied and Tucker sighed as the phone got dropped. There was fumbling noise and then Danny was back apologizing. "Sorry, trying to change."

"You don't have to get naked for me, Danny," Tucker deadpanned. "I'm already taken."

There was no real response, just a strangled sounding laugh that Tucker ignored as he closed the web page he'd been looking at and pulled the other up, then flipped to another page in the book that he'd already had marked. He ran a finger down the text and stopped when he found what he wanted, setting the phone back against his ear firmly and pursing his lips as Danny waited.

"Have you been having other kinds of weird dreams?" Tucker asked, delicately adding, "Of the intimate variety."

Danny cleared his throat and Tucker bit back a laugh. "I'm nineteen and male. Duh. And this better have a point, Tucker, because I swear I'll drop you in the Ghost Zone if you're messing around with me."

"Not messing around, I'm serious. Next to last question. Are you a virgin?" There was silence and Tucker sighed. "Dude, just answer it. If it helps, I'm a virgin."

There was more silence and Tucker was getting ready to start annoying Danny when he finally answered. "Yeah." Short, soft, to the point.

Tucker sighed. This was going to be interesting, and he took a deep breath before hitting the last pertinent question that would be the answer to his hours of research and his more than solid suspicions.

"Danny, do you know that Charlie is hitting on every male over the age of sixteen in town?"

"She wouldn't do that," was all Danny said, but the terse way he said it made Tucker push harder.

Tucker laughed, deliberately making it sound like he knew exactly what he was talking about. "Sure she would, Danny. I took her out the other night while you were hiding out in your room. She tried to get me in bed."

Tucker closed his eyes as he waited for what he expected to follow. He wasn't sure what he wanted more, for his suspicions to be founded, or for him to be way off base. Though how he was going to explain this to Danny if he was wrong, he didn't know. But Tucker knew that there would be no explanation needed as he heard the harsh breathing on the other end of the phone.

He didn't have to be there with Danny to know that the young halfa's eyes were most likely glowing green, and that his hands were probably itching with the desire to hit Tucker. No, there was no need to be there. and he'd certainly hope that Danny didn't decide to come after him—that would be bad. And very painful for Tucker. Possibly fatal if he was right.

"Stay away from her," was what Danny finally said, and for a moment Tucker thought he was wrong after all. But the next words out of Danny's mouth settled his mind for sure. "If you go anywhere near her, I'll kill you."

There was a click, and then the dial tone was echoing in Tucker's ear as he hung the phone up, dropping it to the floor next to his chair and leaning back, letting his head drop against the back of the chair and his eyes closing. This was bad. This was worse than bad.

"Oh fuck," Tucker muttered and sat back up, his eyes training on the text that was bold across his computer.

_According to Jewish and Christian folklore succubi, also known as lilin, are immortal creatures descended from Lilith, the first woman who turned from God after her creation. The only known way to break the spell of a succubus is death, and always the victim's._


	9. Chapter 9

Beneath the Surface

9

"_I'll destroy her."_

_Damned witch, making problems for her even from the Ghost Zone. Bad enough that her death had sent the halfa into a depression that she'd actually had to exert herself to pull him from. No, now he was obsessing over her despite the magic and charm she was exuding in an attempt to seduce him. It was the witch's fault. She knew it._

"_Cursed mortals," she all but growled as she ripped into the fabric between the mortal realm she lived in and the ghost realm the witch was trapped in. It was time to deal with her, to curtail the small ability he had retained. The witch could not be allowed to influence him. No, that was her prerogative._

_But there was still the curse to consider. She would need to tread carefully indeed to avoid the full weight of it bearing down on her. She paused in the swirls of green and myriad doors in shades of purple. It was a thought: perhaps she wasn't gaining ground as she had expected because the witch had cast a death curse when she'd dragged her into the depths of the pool._

_It was a distinct possibility._

_No matter, she thought. Death curse or no, she would deal with the witch. She would just have to do in a manner that would prevent the death curse from removing her. Better if she could wait until immortality had been achieved, but that wasn't an option. Her plans were already on precarious ground because of the hold the girl had on the halfa's heart._

_There was no guarantee that she could snare him without removing the obstacle. She would just have to do it in a way that would negate the curse. It could be done, if handled carefully. It would require some thought to fully handle. But until then, she could at least lay the groundwork for later conquest._

xXx

"This makes absolutely no sense," Sam mused out loud as she sat on her rock in the middle of the Ghost Zone. "Not a damned bit."

She was staring at her ankle, at the shiny white scar tissue that the once bleeding wound had finally left behind. It was the source of her current annoyance, and the cause of the massive headache that pounded behind her eyes. Ghosts didn't bleed. Ghosts didn't scar. In fact, ghosts were nothing more than a semi corporeal manifestation of ectoplasmic energy. They hurt, but they didn't bleed red. They scarred, but only in as much as they consciously wanted it.

A remembered recollection of what they had once been, maybe. And Sam certainly didn't think that she'd be bleeding bright, red, _human_ blood if she was a ghost.

Slender fingers found their way to her wrist, felt the reassuring thump there, then at her throat, a stronger surge. She was alive. It was the only explanation. She was alive and had been kidnapped—ghost napped, as it were—and trapped in the Ghost Zone for reasons unknown. It made no sense.

And at that, it still made more sense than the once a week occasion where she woke up to a handful of food dropped on her rock, to a couple of jugs of water, one of which she squandered recklessly for washing herself and her tiny bikini. In fact, it had happened this morning, and certainly kept Sam from having to strain her magical resources on keeping clean every day of the week. In fact, she had gotten just such a surprise only that morning, and was currently very pleased, if confused, while she contemplated her captivity.

"Either I'm alive, or I'm not ready to move on. But which is it?" There was a charge of heat from behind her and Sam ducked low as she curled around into a crouch, hands up and ready to defend herself from whatever had come.

"You're alive," came a familiar feminine tone, and Sam's eyes narrowed as she stood up straight and very, very angry. Floating in the air in front of her, and apparently very comfortable with it, was Charlie. Charlie, and yet not. Sam knew what Charlie looked like, short golden hair, blue eyes that were only shades darker than Danny's.

Then she realized that she didn't know what Charlie looked like, not before this, because this was Charlie's true face. The spell of True Sight flashed back into Sam's mind and she grimaced as she remembered the way Charlie had wavered when she'd looked at her while under the spell's effects. It had made Sam curious, and she called herself ten kinds of fool for not following up on it like she had wanted to. But no, Tucker had talked her into giving the girl a chance.

And look where it got them all, Sam trapped in the Ghost Zone, and Charlie… Not human. Definitely not human. Her hair was much longer than Sam remembered, past her waist and a glowing white blond that writhed in the air as if it were alive and had a mind of its own. Her hands were longer, more slim than they had been before when she was pretending to be human, and her fingers ended in claws that made Sam's ankle ache in remembrance of the night she had died.

The night she _thought_ she had died, she amended furiously.

She leveled a glare at Charlie, meeting the girl's golden eyes without a flinch. "Why did you bring me here?"

She girl—and Sam's mind froze at the thought of calling her a girl anymore, she wasn't human, Sam only needed to find a name for what she was—arched an eyebrow carelessly, knowingly. "You were getting in the way."

"In the way?"

Charlie flicked clawed fingers at Sam and she winced as a tiny stream of power sent her back, knocking her to the ground and adding injury to insult as her elbows scraped along the rock. "I want the halfa."

Sam paled before forcing herself to her knees and schooling her face into confusion. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't play the fool, witch. The halfa. Danny Phantom. Danny _Fenton_," Charlie spat. "I want him. You were in the way."

"What's he to you?" Sam asked in a low growl as her fingers clawed at the rock while she pulled herself back to her feet. "Why do you want him?"

Charlie laughed and Sam felt faintly sick at the way it seemed like sex on vocal chords. Charlie dropped easily to the ground, her arms crossing in front of her chest, one claw tapping impatiently at her arm. "Let's just say I don't want him. I just want his power."

"What are you?" Sam gasped as a wave of intense longing shot through her, driving her back to her knees. Charlie only laughed, making it even worse as Sam clutched at her stomach, thoughts of Danny flooding through her mind.

"You are a problem, Sam. One I'm going to have to deal with," Charlie said as she ignored Sam's questions. "I want his energy. I want his power. And I can't take it unless he loves me." She paused and chuckled. "Or at least thinks he loves me."

"He doesn't love you," Sam ground out. "He's in love with me. He always will, and nothing you do can change that."

"True," Charlie said with a gay laugh as she clapped her hands together in delight. "But that's the beauty of it all. He doesn't have to be in love with me, or even actually care. I only need to get him into bed. Sex, my dear, is all I need from him."

Sam closed her eyes against the unwanted thoughts of Danny touching Charlie, holding her close and kissing her, taking her to his bed and— She wouldn't think like that, it wasn't going to happen. No matter what, Danny wasn't going to forget her, wasn't going to abandon her. He loved her; he wasn't going to fall in to bed with someone else this quickly.

Sex. Not human, feeding on sex, on lust, not love. Not human, _psychovore_. The word echoed in her mind and Sam blinked up at Charlie. The girl, the creature, had a name now.

"You're one of the lilin," she said evenly, and the spell was suddenly broken, the painful cramping inside Sam abating and letting her regain her feet and stare into the monster's golden eyes.

The blow took Sam across the left side of her face, knocking her to the ground. Blood flooded her mouth as she stared up at the girl, the creature. She'd never even seen it coming. That frightened Sam as she stayed where she was, preferring that Charlie think she was more hurt, more cowed than she actually was. Carefully, deliberately, Sam rolled to one side with a faint moan as she cradled a hand to her injured cheek and spat blood, hoping that the satisfaction of hitting her would distract Charlie while she grounded out the magic that had gathered on automatic.

It worked apparently. For the moment all Charlie was doing was glaring down at her, eyes narrowed into angry yellow slits as her clawed hands curled into fists, odd grayish blood seeping from between her fingers as claws apparently cut into her palms.

"Never call me that," the creature spat out, and Sam allowed a genuine murmur of pain to cross her lips.

"Succubus, then," Sam got out as she pulled herself back to her knees, not bothering to stand this time as she winced, her tongue sliding along the inside of her cheek, over the bleeding cuts her teeth had etched into it. "If you're not lilin, you're still a succubus."

"A smart witch," Charlie said with disdain, returning to her position above Sam, hovering much like Danny did, though Sam could see the power lines as Charlie expended energy to remain above the ground, even in the Ghost Zone.

Sam snorted. _Let's just hope Tucker's smart, too. I know he can figure this out._ She already knew there was no hope of Danny figuring it out without being pushed in that direction. Not with the psychic pressure a succubus would be putting on him, and especially in the fragile state of mind he was in. she knew; she'd seen it.

"He belongs to me now," Charlie said softly, levitating herself higher, farther away. "He's the key to my immortality."

"He doesn't belong to anyone," Sam muttered after the succubus was out of earshot. She dropped back to the ground, curled her knees to her chest, her heartbeat echoing in her ears. She closed her eyes and rested her head against them, her breath sobbing out of her in desperate pleas.

"Please, Tucker, Danny. Help me. Find me." A pause and her tear streaked face lifted to look in the direction Charlie had flown. "Oh, somebody. _Please._"

xXx

If he'd been a little more sane, a little more concerned with appearances, Tucker might have thought it was a bad idea to be skulking around in a cemetery in the middle of the night. Especially considering that he'd traded his usual khaki pants for jeans so dark that the blue seemed black, and the rumpled black trench coat he'd bought for Halloween sometime or other during high school. But it worked, and he made it through the light security (a single man who patrolled the grounds never and watched television always) and prowled his way up the edge of the road toward the section that had Sam's grave.

A right at the statue of a guardian angel, the hand suspiciously missing, looking like it'd be taken off in one clean swipe. Tucker only raised an eyebrow, dug out his PDA and took a picture for later comparison. Left at the mausoleum with dates that went back nearly a century. He knew that it had been built for someone's daughter, like Sam, and he shrugged the thought off as he moved further down the road.

Creeping around the massive crater that was roped off in the middle of said road. Another picture, then a few more as he realized that the damage was caused by Danny. The smooth edges of the missing hand, obvious signs of an ectoblast. The crater would be some hapless ghost being driven into the ground. Literally.

Another left at the wide double headstone for a married couple, with its unique cat shaped urn, full of wilted and dead flowers. Counting the graves all the way down; one, two, twelve, sixteen. It was the first time he'd been there and he was surprised, though he knew he shouldn't be, that her gravestone was already at her grave. A darkish stone, it looked almost black in the moonless night. He could barely make out the faint traceries of veining through it, much paler than the stone itself, and the darker etchings where her name was.

_Beloved Daughter, Treasured Friend._

And beneath the familiar emblem of Danny Phantom, not carved, but melted into to the stone. The granite where it was remained smooth but for a few rivulets that had run and hardened again, into immovable tears of black rock. Danny had been there. he'd seen the signs, knew it logically, but seeing what his best friend—how hard it was to say without saying friends—had done made it hurt all over again.

Especially with the knowledge that was bursting through him: That Sam might not be dead.

"I hope I'm right," he said softly as he tugged one of the many vials from Sam's collection out of one of his pockets. A scrap of notebook paper followed from a different pocket, and Tucker frowned at the mass of illegible scrawls across it.

"Alright, I know I need to work on my handwriting, but this is ridiculous." He glanced around nervously before finally sighing and muttering a short, harsh, "_Fuego_."

Where Sam had flourished in potion making and the softer, more fluid sounds from Celtic traditions, Tucker had always cut straight to the core of the magic he'd studied. Given that most of his books, and nearly all of his spell work, that he studies was in Latin, he'd thought it prudent to study the language. It had led to him being able to use concise spells that had been tasted over centuries, such as the fire spell he'd summoned.

It was known by several names: witchlight, werelight, rushlight. He figured that by any name it was still a light, and began scanning the paper under the small blue orb that hovered at his shoulder, inches above it and a foot ahead, illuminating the spell and the headstone.

The vial was uncorked, and Tucker dumped the contents to the ground underneath Sam's headstone. It was a volatile mixture that he only knew basics of. Monkshood, nettle, sap from an oak tree. All of it blended in water Sam had gotten from an untainted source. She'd never told him where, he realized as he watched the mixture soak into the grass and sod. The only thing that didn't was the strand of Sam's hair that Tucker had broken into her house to find earlier that day.

Lord only knew that if he felt weird about sneaking around in the graveyard, he'd felt even worse about breaking and entering his best friend's house. Even is she was dead. Especially because she was dead. Supposedly.

That was what this whole expedition was about. Either that, or an exercise in futility.

He began chanting in a low sing-song voice. The words were Latin, but mostly it was something that was beyond his translation skill on the fly. He'd only read enough to know that it, the spell when combined with the potion, would work as a sort of magical tracer. If focused on a particular place, local, it would be able to tell the caster if what was looked for was there or not. And Tucker was really hoping it was an 'or not.'

He finished and let the light fade out, closing his eyes as he waited for the spell to give him an answer. He waited, he worried. Had he cast it properly? Was the potion alright, or had it gone past its peak? That had been an arguing point between Sam and Tucker, he thought with a faint grin. She had always maintained that potions were best used by a certain time, depending on what it was made of. Tucker had always countered that a potion was a potion and could be used whenever.

He had the sinking feeling that Sam was about to prove him right at the very worst time.

And then he felt a faint tingling as magic rushed back up from the ground, warm and stinging as it raced up his legs and spread through his torso, down his arms, and up his neck to his head. A picture was forming behind his eyes, and it was a painful attempt to try and understand what was happening. Finally he opened them, wondering if he was going to be able to understand what the hell was going on in his head, and what the spell was trying to tell him.

But the answer, the how, was in front of him.

An echo of her coffin floated in front of him, translucent and level with his eyes. For a moment Tucker felt faintly ill, afraid of what he was being shown. Until he realized that it was _just_ a coffin. There was nothing inside it. The spell began to dissipate as Tucker stood there, eyes closed and tears streaking down his cheeks. The sliver of moon that had been hidden behind clouds since sunset slipped from behind clouds, illuminating him and making him open his eyes and stare up at it.

It was nearly gone.

A smile broke out and Tucker hugged himself as the last vestiges of the spell sank back into the ground, the ghostly image of her coffin with it. But not Sam. _Not Sam._ Even as the fierce joy swept through him Tucker cautioned himself against it.

"Don't get your hopes up, Tuck. We need to actually look inside before we start thinking it."

He didn't say what it was, but he knew. Just like the faint knot in his belly knew. Sam was alive. Now all he had to do was prove it to Danny. After that, finding her would be easy. He hoped.

xXx

"I'll have to make her kill herself," Charlie decided from where she watched the sleeping figure of the witch girl. The curse was more difficult to get around than she had expected. For a mortal with no natural mage talents, she certainly had unlocked every last bit she could find.

She had tried again to seduce the halfa, and this time it hadn't gone any further than a smile and a hug. She hadn't even managed to so much as kiss his cheek before he was brushing her off. He was entirely too focused on the dead girl, and Charlie simply couldn't break whatever bound the two together without serious consequences to herself. Possibly fatal, something she wasn't willing to contemplate since she was still mortal.

And she hadn't lived as long as she had to simply let this opportunity slip through her fingers.

She didn't really believe that it was love that bound the halfa and the witch, but she was beginning to believe that it was true. For all that she had scorned tales of true love, had used the emotion against her victims, she didn't really believe in it. But the halfa was still too attached to the girl, and there was a growing worry in the back of mind that if she didn't manage to eliminate the witch, she'd never be able to bring the halfa to her bed.

And there was an even greater worry that even once she eliminated the witch, that it wouldn't matter. That the bonds between them would stretch between life and death. Normally it would be a stretch, even for a creature such as herself. But given the fact that the boy was human _and_ ghost, it was perfectly understandable to have a concern that even after she was dead, his ghost half—already dead as it was—would still be bound to her.

Which only made it more imperative that the witch kill herself. If she was truly murdered, she would have unfinished business to keep her tied to the mortal plane. She would have the need to find her killer and bring them to justice. There was a considerable chance that the death curse would negate that need, but Charlie would be very dead even if she had someone else kill the witch. The curse had been leveled at her and hung over her head every moment of the day.

Even if the girl died of natural causes, she might still find herself as a ghost because she wanted so badly to protect the halfa. To help him and whatnot. And since she had been removed forcibly from her own world, it gave her motive for unfinished business. Which was why suicide was the only option.

Whether or not one believed in God, or even in religion in general, there was something about suicide that made it impossible to become a ghost, to remain tied to the portal plane. No, if you took your own life, you became bound into a world of your own creation. Which would leave Charlie free to seduce the halfa, and Sam to linger in her own never ending nightmare.

So, suicide it was.

She'd already managed to erode the girl's walls a bit on her previous visit. Had it only been that morning? She obviously knew what the lilin were, and succubi in general. So the witch knew exactly the task her little boyfriend faced to escape her. A daunting task, even for someone who wasn't affected by the magic. Impossibly, or as near as made no difference, for the one under the spell.

She would have to chip away at the girl's knowledge, her security in the love of the halfa. It would be easy. Even if she hadn't already known, she knew he'd never told Sam. Danny had tried, but she'd stopped him before he could. A stroke of luck on her part, she hadn't planned that. It would be so easy to turn the moment in the pool the night she'd taken the witch into nothing more than a teenaged boy's cheap thrill. A cheap thrill with his oh so willing best friend.

It was perfectly, deliciously cruel.

With a dark smile she picked up the girl's remaining water and dumped it across her head, laughing as the automatic response was to roll up into a fighting stance, crouched back with arms extended and hands in fists. It was too funny, that even when she was so utterly helpless that she would try to defend herself. Ridiculous really, and the humor left as quickly as it came leaving Charlie annoyed with herself.

"Please," she snarled. "You can't hurt me."

"What do you want," the girl finally asked in a veiled threat, hands still up.

"I came to tell you that you're dead."

Sam didn't so much as flinch and Charlie only grew angrier at the rising respect as she faced her captive. "You already told me that I am. I haven't died since you left, so what's your problem?"

Charlie smiled and waved a hand at the puddle water that was now between the two. It flickered, shimmered, and then suddenly resolved itself into a shadowy image. A graveyard, lined in headstones, and becoming clearer by the second until it was finally a sunny brightness, and complete with dozens of people, some standing, some in chairs, and a coffin buried under a mass of white and lavender flowers in front of them all.

Her coffin, she realized as she saw her parent's front and center, teary eyed and huddled close. Further back there was Tucker, looking remarkably dry eyed until she realized that his face was blotchy, even under his coffee dark skin, and his eyes were bloodshot. His parent's were on either side of him, his mother with her arm around his shoulders, his father who had a hand clapped to his arm, holding him like he was afraid of what Tucker might do if given the chance.

She recognized some kids from high school, a couple from college who lived in the area. A girl from an art class, a boy who she had tutored in senior year. Her biochemistry lab partner from her first year at college. Valerie, for a real surprise. She managed to actually look upset, even if she didn't look like a wreck. And Dash, who she hadn't expected to see ever again.

A flash of blinding light at the puddle was centering in on a group of people, all easily recognizable. The hulking tower that was Jack Fenton, hugging his much smaller wife as they both did their best not to cry. Sam smiled sadly. She'd always wanted to have parents like that, had always settled for them being the second parents she'd never had and always wanted. They'd obviously felt the same, and had taken her invented death hard.

Jazz's familiar red head was leaning on the shoulder of a taller, very handsome man that Sam supposed would be her fiancé Ryan. Wavy brown hair, green eyes and an even complexion that definitely complimented Jazz's looks. Even better the way he held on to her like if he let go of her for a second he might lose her. He didn't look particularly upset for any reason other than Jazz was hurting. It worked.

And past them, sitting a little off to one side, Danny.

He looked… terrible. And that was putting it nicely. His hair was messy, more so than usual, and he was too pale. His eyes were like Tucker's bloodshot, but there was a faraway look in them that made her winder what he was thinking of. He looked so sad… There were circles under his eyes, too. She knew that he wasn't sleeping. She'd seen that when she'd tried to project herself to him, and very nearly had. And when he was sleeping, it wasn't anything close to restful.

Sounds wafted up from the puddle. Sniffling, the faint sound of crying. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…" Sam closed her eyes against it all and turned away, for a moment not caring that she was turning her back on the enemy. Anything was better than watching her own funeral, the people she loved so hurt, the boy—man—she had loved for years so despondent. It broke her heart to know Danny was hurting so badly for no real reason. If she had actually been dead, that would be one thing.

But she wasn't, and knowing that he, that they all had been so hurt by this cruel farce just for that monster to try and gain immortality… It made her sick. Worse, it made her angry.

Charlie laughed behind her, harsh and grating. "You're dead, little witch. Give it up, let him go."

Sam stayed silent and strained her ears for the telltale movement that would mean the bitch had gone. It came, sooner than she had expected, and Sam turned to see the dot that was growing smaller the further away she moved. The puddle was just that, nothing more than a puddle. Sam kicked a foot through it in anger, feeling more like her old self than she had since she'd first woke up in the Ghost Zone.

She took a deep breath, eyes narrowed after the monster that was no longer visible. "You'd better hope that one of them kills you before I can get my power back." A nearly idle threat, Sam knew. Nothing short of Charlie's death would give her what she'd spent so recklessly on the death curse, and it explained why she weakened so quickly no matter how much power she managed to collect.

But it didn't matter how Charlie died. All that mattered was that she died, and her magic would be back, and she could ensure that the monster got what she deserved. After all, Sam had all the time in the world to figure out how to make her suffer.

"And I will," Sam muttered as she kicked the puddle again. "You're going to wish you'd never been spawned."


	10. Chapter 10

Beneath the Surface

10

_Three more days of nothing from the damnable boy. If she didn't know better she'd think that she'd lost her magic, instead of squandering it all on the foolish even more damnably stubborn witch. One refused to submit to her physical charms, the other refused to bow before her more powerful magic. Though how much more she wasn't sure, considering the girl had been pulling off some fairly impressive diversions to try and prevent Charlie from focusing her will on what she wanted: seducing Danny._

_But he was as oblivious to her as he had been to the witch for years, if she was understanding the 'clueless' stories his family liked to tell, fondly and with sorrowful frowns as they realized every time they trotted said stories out they made Danny feel worse. For having squandered his chance with his precious little Sam._

_Sam. It was enough to make her sick._

_All because of one little mortal whore would the halfa refuse to come to her bed, to join with her and submit to the physical intimacy she required to completely siphon his power. Certainly she was able to drain an acceptable amount now, she'd sunk several more conduits into the hapless creature and was sustaining herself. Almost._

_She was still trying to avoid over hunting the own, lest someone begin t suspect that something inhuman had come to Amity Park. At least, more inhuman than the ghostly visitors who staged regular incursions. But she was beginning to get truly desperate. She had so little time left before he would be able to return to school, throw himself into his studies and forget everyone, everything._

_Avoidance was a skill Daniel Fenton was well versed in._

_He was making noises about returning to school early and getting a head start with his graduate program, with adding another minor to concentrate on. Anything to avoid thinking about what had happened the summer he had finally come home for a visit. And if he did return, there were no guarantees he wouldn't be able to pull the disappearing stunts he'd spent two years perfecting, one of them being on Charlie herself._

_No. she'd have to double her efforts. Triple them, even. She couldn't drain him as it stood now; there simply wasn't a deep enough connection for all of the conduits. None went far enough into his psyche to make the effort worth his death. None of them would grant her the degree of contact she needed to gain enough power to live forever._

_She'd have to hurry even more. The little witch was getting more restless with each passing day. True, she despaired. But she was managing to be a bigger distraction than before, though now only to Charlie since the halfa seemed to be relying on memories to sustain thoughts of the witch. Soon. It had to be soon._

_Because if it wasn't, she'd have to kill him whether or not she could steal his life._

xXx

Two more days passed before Charlie found the chance to start her seduction games anew. She had decided that she would push it as far as she dared, even if it meant weakening the spells around the little witch to do so. It was a risk, but one she had to take. All she needed was for him to let go completely. He was male, it couldn't really be _that_ hard.

If it hadn't been for the setbacks that she had encountered, Charlie might have found it intriguing. He was the first mortal to ever resist him when it cam to her games of seduction. Between the halfa and the little witch, she expected she could have spent years trying to break through to him. But she did have the dilemma of needing the witch out of the way. Her feelings were far too strong to allow her near him unchecked.

And the halfa was unhealthily attached for someone who wasn't entirely human. She sighed. She'd thought that perhaps his ghost half would make his emotions towards humans, especially the girl, weaker. Instead, it only seemed to intensify everything he was feeling. A wonderful attribute if you were an empath, or a full ghost with a haunt and obsessions. Instead it seemed to have made him obsessive over the things he cared about, in both of his forms.

She waited for the front door to creak open following the footsteps down the hall and stairs, then listened to it close with a pleased smile. The loving family, off for one last visit with the future son-in-law before he flew back to the east coast. All of them gone, every last one, except for Danny. Danny, whom she had made sure would beg off because he'd been neglecting his duties as host, no matter that he didn't actually feel like playing lord of the manor with her.

He was so jumpy around her, uncomfortable to the point of barely being able to look her in the eye. That, at least, showed that he was embarrassed by his attraction.

It was something she could use against him, would use against him now that they were alone in the house. There would be no one to hear them, no one for Danny to be able to use as an excuse. No "They might hear us," or "What if someone notices something?" Not this time, she had everything taken care of, planned. She would seduce him, bring him to her bed or join him in his, and then she would drain him to death and use the power to make herself immortal and take her rightful place at her mother's side among the lilin.

Then she'd take her rightful place as the ruler of the lilin, the most powerful succubi the ranks of Lilith's daughters had seen in thousands of years.

For this Charlie had chosen her clothes carefully. Barefoot, something that would make her seem naïve, hopeful, very young and feminine. Her short hair was carefully framing her face, freshly cleaned so that it would be smooth and silky soft beneath his fingers. And a distractingly simple white shirt and jeans shorts. It would make him think she was harmless, she dressed just like other human girls. And nothing like the little witch, so he wouldn't be able to make comparisons.

Another closing door, this time the fridge door, and not long after Charlie heard the careful footsteps of the halfa on the stairs, light and steady. Well balanced, and she could at least admire his ever vigilant mindset. He was always prepared now, had been for most of the time she had hunted him, for ghost attacks. He was a good fighter, better than average considering he'd had no training. She'd seen him fight once and had been pleasantly surprised by the violent blend of street fighting and bits and pieces of martial arts he'd picked up.

From his mother, she knew, and the ghost hunter who had hunted him throughout high school. It was a potent blend that was only made stronger by instinct and experience. She'd even seen his ruthless streak that only came out when need be. It made him feel guilty to do what needed to be done most times; had it been her she would never have returned any of the captured ghosts to the Ghost Zone. She would have enslaved or destroyed them.

But there was the difference between him and most of the world. After all, how many fourteen year old teenaged human males could have taken on the burden that he had and come out on the other side sane and working for the greater good? Not many. Of that she was sure. Perhaps no one else.

She heard him stop at his door, knew he was looking over at her closed one, and then sigh as he moved into his own. And then her cue: he didn't close his door behind him. She opened her door a crack, saw that the only light in his room came form a lamp by his bed, not form his computer, and walked silently to his room to stand in the doorway and look inside at him.

He really was a pleasant looking specimen. The night black hair, the oh so blue eyes. She'd never really seen anyone else with eyes that particular shade of blue, and Charlie had seen many, many moral eyes. She'd killed her fair share of them in her quest to remain alive and young. Which was why she really needed to make this work.

To that effect she began weaving spells, pulling magic from all of her resources, including the spells that hedged the witch in, weakening them enough that she could probably get a message through if she knew how. But given that she had no natural talent, no true innate ability, Charlie was hedging her bets that the girl would have focused her studies primarily on magic, and completely left the other arts, psionics, to wither in decay.

She wove carefully, slowly, building layer upon layer of seductive glamour. This one to make her eyes inescapable, so that he'd feel like he was falling into them when she caught his stare. That one to make her hair softer, smoother than it already was. This one to make her skin silky, that one to draw his attention to the tiny span of her human form's waist. Another one, a final one, the most powerful of all, to excite him, to make him desire her.

He wasn't escaping her this time, not if she could help it.

A small step into the room, leaning _just so_ on a board so that Danny popped up startled and curious from where he'd been lying on his bed, one arm flung over his eyes. The shades were drawn, not that it mattered, it was already night, but Charlie knew that even with the faint light from the single lamp, she was backlit perfectly by the lights in the hall.

"Charlie," he said uncertainly, and she smiled as his pupils dilated to leave only a slit of blue around it, the way his mouth parted just slightly, the way his hands clenched on the bedspread as he looked at her.

"I got lonely," she said softly as she walked over towards him, stopping in front of him, far enough away that he would have to actually reach out to grab hold of her and draw her to him when the time came. That was when she drew more power, leaving the witch completely uncontained save for the spell that bound her to that single rock out in the Ghost Zone.

Blue met blue and Charlie waited for a moment, then unleashed the seduction glamour to its fullest. She knew it had caught him, completely and utterly, when his nostrils flared and his eyes shifted from hers lower. Danny reached an arm out, snagged her by the waist, making Charlie smile as he pulled her close, snugging her against him, his legs barring hers from the outside and his fingers hot through the thin cotton of her shirt.

He reached up with his lips, not a great distance considering that she had made her current form short, even for a girl, and that his was a long, lean form. When he kissed her she shuddered against him, the seduction glamour washing over her as she fed at his mouth, hungry and aching as power flowed into her. The whimpered as he pulled her closer, making her climb onto the bed, onto him, straddling his thighs as his hands tugged at her shirt ineffectually.

"I want this off of you," he said softly, huskily, and she nodded, pleased as his hands slid underneath the hem smoothly, drawing it up her body, along her arms and over her head as she obligingly lifted her arms.

And when it was nothing more than a crumpled pile on the floor she found his mouth again, draining more power from him as she began to tug at his shirt, stripping it from his lean body and purposely not acknowledging the scars that were scattered across his lean body. Even so she could feel him drawing back, eyes flickering as the glamour fought to regain its full control over the halfa while he struggled with whatever self control was trying to assert itself in his mind.

She bit back the growl that was building in her throat and narrowed her eyes. She was close, so close, and she wasn't about to let a crisis of halfa conscience ruin these carefully laid plans. She'd already been dealt enough setbacks. Ruthlessly she dropped her handful of glamour's and focused all of her remaining power into the seduction spell, smiling in satisfaction when his eyes drew steadily on hers again and his mouth dropped to the soft skin of her neck.

_Much better,_ she thought as his hands were sliding to the button at the front of her shorts. More than better she decided as he unexpectedly rolled her off of him, back onto his bed, and covered her body with his own, his mouth claiming hers again in a fierce kissed fueled and fed by the seduction glamour. It would be tonight, it would be very soon, nearly now she realized.

He was taking the initiative and tugging her shorts off, fingers nimble at she arched her back to let him have access to the clasp of her bra. She wasn't one to waste time and Charlie was easily undoing the button and zipper on his own jeans, satisfied that all was going as planned, better than planned if his lips on the skin above her collarbone was anything to judge by. For all that he was unschooled in the art of pleasure, he was a wonderfully quick study. She was actually enjoying herself beyond the satisfaction of draining his energy.

And then he stopped. Not slowed, not paused. Just stopped, with his jeans pushed low over his hips, his hands on the undone clasp of her bra, his mouth pressed against sensitive skin, he just _stopped_. "Danny?" she asked breathily, trying to maintain the seduction glamour even as she raged at his stillness. "Is something wrong?"

He didn't say anything as he drew back, tugging his jeans back up and redoing the button as he backed away from the bed, one hand to his head and the other grabbing up her clothes and shoving them at her with an apology written across his face. "I'm sorry, Charlie. I can't do this. I'm really sorry."

She seethed. There was no other word for it as she tugged her shirt over her head without doing the clasp of her bra, tugged on her shorts and slid off of the bed on the other side, as far away from Danny as she could get. "Sam?" she asked, certain she already knew the answer and wanting to curse the damned witch girl more than ever.

He nodded faintly. "I am sorry."

She shrugged as she stopped in the doorway, one hand on the knob, starting to pull it closed. "Don't worry about it, Danny." The door clicked softly and she paced her way back to her room, careful to not slam the door in her anger and frustration. So much power wasted and so little regained, comparatively.

"Don't worry about it," she muttered darkly as golden eyes glared at the door, through to his. "Next time you won't get away."

xXx

It was embarrassing, he supposed. More than embarrassing, knowing that he'd just had his roommate from college underneath him on his bed, so soon after the death of the only woman he'd ever loved. Devastating was a word, because for the life of him, he couldn't figure out how it had happened. He'd been laying there, thinking about Sam and how happy and easy things had been before they'd all gone off to college. Comparatively, of course, because no one in high school should ever try and balance the things he, Sam and Tucker had always been trying to.

And then she'd been there. Charlie. Standing in his doorway, silhouetted by the lights from the hall, and telling him that she was lonely.

He was only human. Well, half human. But it was still no excuse, and no reason. There just wasn't a reason, wasn't a way to explain it. She'd just stood in front of him and then he'd been on her, mauling her practically, all the time not really wanting to, wishing that it was Sam, not Charlie. He'd tried to stop for a moment before he'd ended up with her mostly naked underneath him, but something weird had happened. Weirder than normal, and it had felt like his brain had just… fallen asleep on the job.

The next thing he knew he was undoing her bra and she was trying to push his jeans off, making the most interesting sounds. Sounds that he'd much rather hear coming from Sam's throat, breaking across Sam's lips. No matter that she was dead, that there hadn't ever been a real relationship, he wasn't ready to just jump into bed with anyone else.

Hell, he'd never jumped into bed with anyone at all. He wasn't going to let his first time be a meaningless one night stand. And that's what it came down to. Beyond the actual physical attraction that seemed to be rearing its ugly little head nonstop since Charlie had come to Amity Park, there wasn't anything else there. He cared about her, but only as friends. Really, only as friends, and not the desperate friends status that he'd always kept Sam relegated to until he'd finally started thinking with his brain.

It had been the way her hands had slid down his hips, he thought. The way they had been small, and hot, and nothing at all like the hands he knew so well, had always wanted to do the very same thing. Charlie wasn't Sam, no matter what his hormones were trying to get him to do. She just wasn't, and he wasn't interested.

Simple as that.

"Right," he groaned and shifted from his stomach to his side. He wasn't interested, which was why he couldn't lay on his stomach comfortably. Granted, part of that problem was from the thought of doing what he'd just done to Charlie to Sam. It had made it worse.

And it made his head hurt. It was a steady, pounding ache, like the heavy bass in Sam's favorite rock music. And more than that he was tired. Really tired, almost dead on his feet, no pun intended he was sure. It was like one moment he'd been ready to go, perfectly capable of sustaining as much physical exertion as he could muster. And now he just wanted to close his eyes and go to sleep. Except for the damned headache.

It was making him see things, too, as violently throbbing as it was, it was making him see things that weren't there. in the corner of his room was a shimmering, shifting shadow that wasn't real. He was sure of it, and tugged his pillow over his head, trying to block everything even the pain out as he hid his face. Then there was a muffled sigh from outside of his darkened little world, and Danny bit back a groan.

"I hope this works." Whispered, and Danny did groan. Now he was hearing things, too.

But instead of remaining where he was he pulled himself up, the pillow tossed back to his headboard and eyes wearily trying to focus in the direction that the voice had come from, the direction that had the shimmering, shifting, unresolved spot in the corner. The faded and steadily resolving form of Sam. He blinked. And then again, and yet again.

And still she was there, standing in the corner wearing the same black bikini he'd seen her in before, the same bikini that she'd worn the night she died. Sam, who was blinking violet eyes around, desperately hoping she'd made it to the right place, that she hadn't projected too weakly, or even too much, overshooting what she wanted and driving her into his dreams. While that would be pleasant, it wasn't what she intended.

Danny gasped a breath, her name on his lips but unable to form, and Sam looked over at him and smiled widely. "Oh, thank god. Danny," was all she managed before he was off of the bed like a shot, one hand reaching out and grabbing onto her by the arm, and they both gasped when it held firmly.

"You're real," he whispered. "You're here."

She nodded and found herself swept up into a kiss as different from the ones they had shared before. Gentle, still, yes, but hot, needy, desperate. Despairing, she knew as she slid her arms around his neck, a wild sob building inside of her as she surrendered herself to him, knowing that she was wasting precious time with it, squandering what little power she'd hoarded and used recklessly when the spells that hedged her inside the Ghost Zone weakened.

She whimpered against him as his arms wrapped around her, pulling her tight against him. "Danny," she whispered, desperate to continue, more desperate to stop as she felt herself already beginning to fade. It took more to stay solid than she had thought, especially since when she used the magic it preferred to seep into the death curse she'd cast on Charlie.

She didn't have much time.

Less than she had thought, she realized as he refused to let her go, lips hot against hers, tongue sliding into her mouth to slide against hers. He was firm against, every last bit of him, and she twisted in his arms, pulling away and trying to control her sudden urge to forget what she had planned and just throw herself into his arms, and into his bed.

_I am not a horny teenager,_ she thought fiercely at herself as she tore her lips from Danny's, heart pounding in her chest as she did so. _I am a grown woman, a mage, and I control myself. Not my hormones._

But at least she had Danny's attention, lust addled as it was. Even then his eyes never really lost the faint shadow of sorrow that she'd seen on his face every time she'd made it back to their world since her entrapment in the Ghost Zone. "She was here, wasn't she?" Sam managed evenly, gasping at the sudden, wrenching ache that kept her from saying Charlie's name.

"Who was here?" Danny asked as he tried to pull Sam back to him. The confusion was obvious as he asked, "What are you talking about?"

So he didn't know, he had no idea that he was being manipulated into whatever Charlie was doing with him. She'd obviously been doing something, because Danny certainly wasn't acting exactly like himself. Most likely Sam had followed an aborted attempt at seducing Danny into Charlie's bed. It was, she thought derisively, furiously, nothing more than a type of rape. And while she'd never been in the position to know what that was like, she hated to wonder how Danny would deal with knowing how he'd been manipulated and used is—when—he managed to break the spell that the succubus had set on him.

He was so strong, so set on protecting anyone, even at the cost to himself. She shook her head, it didn't bear thinking about right now. First tings first, find a way to save him, or show him the way to save himself.

"It doesn't matter," she whispered and held a hand out that was fading translucent. "I don't have a lot of time, and I can't tell you what I want to." She paused, closed her eyes against the wave of dizziness as more power drained from her. "Help me, Danny. Please, come find me."

"Find you?" It was gratifying to see the lust begin to bleed away from his eyes, but almost comical to see the confusion that was taking its place. He was smart, he'd figure it out. She hoped.

Sam gasped as her entire consciousness shifted back to the Ghost Zone for a split second, and she whimpered as she flashed back into Danny's room, with him barely supporting her as she leaned against him weakly. "Please, Danny," she said faintly. "I need your help."

And this time when she flickered back to the Ghost Zone, she stayed, collapsed against the rock unable to do anything more than roll to her side. _He's smart,_ she thought faintly as darkness shifted over her. _He'll figure it out. And if he doesn't, Tucker will._


	11. Chapter 11

Beneath the Surface

11

_Degrading, disgusting, deplorable. To be forced to seduce yet another human when, if the fool of a halfa would but give her the chance, she could live forever and never, ever be forced to seduce another mortal to her bed. And yet he was still fighting. Pitiful, he didn't even realize that eh was; he was only wasting her time and the lives of the people he fought so hard to protect._

_He would fall, one way or another._

_But until then she had to recoup the power she expended on his behalf. Already she had drained more than a dozen unsuspecting mortals of their lives. She was incredibly lucky that most had been in the later middle ages and she had been able to disguise it as a lovers tryst gone horribly bad with the markers of a stroke, a coronary, an aneurism. One of any of a number of simple human ailments._

_Frail, unnatural creatures; constantly striving to avoid death, and merely labeling their downfall, prolonging it with their useless drugs, surgeries. It made her sick to know that she had to consort with them at all, much less that she depended on them to survive. Even the halfa turned her stomach at times, knowing that beneath the power that roiled about him like a barely contained predator, he had started just like all of the others._

_Human._

_Sick, disgusting creature. She smiled. Soon enough, he would be out of his misery, and she would be enjoying the immortality that she well deserved._

xXx

It was, Tucker realized, a hopeless impasse. He had a serious decision to make, a task that _must_ be carried out with no less than perfect precision. And he had absolutely no way of doing it. He had the knowledge, the will, the drive. But in the end, his magic failed him; he could find no spell that would accomplish what he wanted, what he needed. Nothing to give him incontrovertible proof.

That Sam Manson was alive.

He'd thought about, really thought about it. There had been the insanity of nearly seven minutes where he had debated whether or not he could go to the Manson's for help. Whether he _should_ go to the Manson's for help. Sure, he could reveal the fact that magic existed and he as well as their beloved and possibly not deceased daughter were capable practitioners. He might even be able to show them a spell or two before they either laughed in his face or called the police.

With any luck he might be able to get out the demand for an exhumation cleverly disguised as a request. And then he would immediately be sent away to a mental hospital where he was shrunk three times a day for years before Jazz managed to find a way to get him out with endangering her own practice. Once she had one, that is.

Besides that, Tucker knew that he could never go to them anyway. Mrs. Manson was still too… broken. And her husband was little better. He knew this, he'd seen it himself. There was no way he could go to them, it was out of the question.

He could always do it the hard way, find a dark stormy night and dig her coffin up himself. But that would take too long and be too obvious. Without a court ordered exhumation he's be looking at a multitude of criminal charges on top of the inevitable psychiatric evaluation if he were caught. Clearly, yet another dead end. No magic, no Manson's, no backbreaking labor. It only left one option, one that Tucker had hoped to avoid.

Danny.

And he wasn't much better than the Manson's. Sick with grief, heart sore, spell stricken. The halfa was a walking advertisement for miserable. But, and Tucker knew it was the truth, he was also the best, the safest, the most sure way of getting the answers that Tucker so desperately needed. And, he thought with a pained sigh as he rubbed the bridge of his nose, lying his glasses on his desk next to his keyboard, depending on what the answers to his questions were, Danny being involved might be the best thing that could happen.

Depending. It would kill Danny if he did as Tucker asked and they found her corpse in the coffin instead of what Tucker was expecting. It would kill him, or drive him insane. Which would most likely end up killing everyone in Amity Park and then, by proxy, the rest of the world.

Ah, decisions, decisions.

With a sigh Tucker reached for his cell phone, eyes still closed against the headache that was building behind his eyes. At least he had an excuse to call Danny; even with Sam's death and the mess that Danny was buried in, Tucker knew that he was having way too many migraines than was healthy for him. It only meant one thing: it was time for a new prescription, and he could talk Danny into going along to pick out frames.

The number was dialed automatically, and Tucker waited patiently as it rang while he waited for Danny to pick up. He chuckled when he heard the mostly asleep grunt that Danny assumed passed for a hello. "Are you asleep?"

A rustle of blanket and Tucker imagined that Danny was pulling his blankets back over his head. "If I were asleep, dude, do you think I'd be talking to you?"

Tucker laughed this time. "I was headed out to the mall. Want to go with?"

"Is it actual shopping?" Danny asked.

"I need some new glasses."

There was a long silence and then a sigh. "Yeah. Give me enough time to grab a shower."

Tucker hung up the phone with an almost satisfied smile on his face. Phase One was complete. Phase Two, however, would be a bit more complicated, but Tucker thought he'd planned it fairly well by the time he pulled up in front of Danny's house and honked. The door opened immediately and Tucker laughed to see Danny darting out of the house, Jazz yelling from behind him as Danny tugged on a shirt and shouted back at her.

"She looks like she's pissed," Tucker observed as Danny ducked into the car. "What'd you do?"

Tired blue eyes glared at Tucker. "Why does it always have to be me? I didn't _do_ anything." Then he smirked. "I only said that her fiancé was a dork."

Tucker sighed. "Your sister is twenty-two. I'd say that if she wants to marry a dork, she can marry a dork."

Danny shrugged. "I know. I'm just giving her grief."

The rest of the ride was in silence, one of the two men nearly asleep, the other too tense to relax. For his part, Tucker had seen how tired Danny was, and knowing what had done it and why only made him furious. There wasn't anything he could do about it yet, but that would change. All he had to do was prove that his theory was correct, and then either snap Danny back to his senses, or take the succubus out on his own.

Snapping Danny back to his senses it was.

"Dude, wake up," Tucker said as he shook Danny's shoulder.

The halfa sat up looking around sleepily, eyes blinking lazily and brain still fuzzy to find that they were already parked, car turned off, and Tucker out of the car and leaning over him to wake him up. "You know, if you were a little more attractive and female, this could be pleasant," Danny muttered as Tucker stepped back with a chuckle.

"So, new glasses," Danny muttered as he followed Tucker through the crowds and into one of the stores, raising an eyebrow at some of the 'latest fashions' where they were displayed in the window. "Do people actually wear these things?"

Tucker shrugged. "People with no taste do. Like Paulina," and he grinned at his friend as Danny rolled his eyes.

"Look, Danny, I need to ask you to do something," Tucker shot out after he'd signed in on the optometrist's waiting list. "It's really important, and you know I wouldn't ask you for anything except I can't do it myself..."

"Tuck, you're my best friend," Danny said and ignored the way his best friend's face clouded as he said it, once again consciously forcing himself not to plural the word like he wanted to from habit. "Just ask, I'll do it."

"Maybe you should hear me out before you agree, Danny," Tucker said quietly as he turned to a wall of frames and poked at a few before sliding a pair off to look at and then put back as he realized they were in a tortoise shell pattern.

"What about these?" Danny asked as he pointed to a pair or rounded frames in black. Tucker was still silent as he tried them on a shrugged, putting them back. "Tuck, what's wrong?"

Tucker pulled another pair off, put them back, and then another. "I went to Sam's grave a couple nights ago. I ran a spell, Danny. It says that… that her coffin is empty." He spared a glance for the painful and shell-shocked expression on his best friends face before plowing straight into it.

"I need you to bring her coffin up so I can make sure that spell wasn't misreading it."

The silence was thick as Tucker looked away, unable to watch the emotions that flitted across Danny's face, and knowing it for retreat at the relief when his name was called. Danny said nothing as Tucker hurried away and, in fact, didn't even notice as his mind wrapped itself around the fact, the thought, the hope that what Tucker was saying was true.

And then it twisted inside him as he realized that an empty coffin didn't necessarily mean what he'd hoped. There were other explanations, other things that made even more sense than Sam not being dead, than the faint hope that she was alive. Even after her begging him to find her, to save her. Even if she really did need to be found, to be saved, that still didn't mean she was alive. Her spirit could be in danger, her ghost. Sam wasn't well loved by the inhabitants of the Ghost Zone, if she did happen to be a ghost. Neither was Tucker. In fact, the only person they hated more was Danny himself.

But it wasn't the only explanation. Maybe her parents had had her cremated and hadn't shared the information. But no, Danny remembered that the viewing had been an open casket, and Sam had been on display for her grieving friends and family. Just one more reason why he hadn't gone; seeing her again… At that point, it might have hurt more than helped, knowing as he did that the last time he had seen her was when he'd held her lifeless body in his arms. Before that, when he was staring at her as she stood next to her body.

Before that when he had kissed her, held her, tried to tell her that he loved her.

Danny bit his lip against the sudden tightness in his chest, the burning feeling behind his eyes. He rubbed his fingers over them firmly, telling himself that tears did no good, that he needed to stop, just stop. It helped, a little. Not much, but a little, and Danny found himself able to open his eyes without fear that he would collapse underneath the weight of the pain. No, he could push it back, bury it down, just for a little.

He'd pay for it later, but for now, he could hide behind the thoughts that his mind threw at him, the myriad possibilities to explain why Sam's coffin was empty, why Tucker was asking him to bring it up. The morbid need to look inside himself and know, to just _know_ for a fact that it was either empty, or it wasn't. The fervent desire to drop to his knees and pray, beg, plead, _anything_ that it was empty, that she wasn't in there.

_Please, Danny._

He had to. There was no getting around it, he had to. And as Danny realized that he had already made up his mind he looked up to find Tucker standing back in front of him, worry on his familiar features, his green eyes cloudy and concerned. He smiled faintly, nodded his head. "I'll do it. For her."

Tucker smiled, some of the worry disappearing. "Thank you."

Danny nodded and glanced at a pair of frames clenched tightly in Tucker's hands, realizing his friend was still wary of him. He laughed. "Are those what you're getting?" he asked, and Tucker nodded holding up a pair of black metal frames shaped into slightly rounded rectangles.

"Big change, huh?" Tucker asked, and as Danny made a face he laughed. "This is a pretty messed up day, isn't it?"

Danny shrugged. "Seems pretty normal for me. So a couple days, huh?"

Tucker mimicked Danny's shrug. "That's how long it took me to buck up the nuts to ask you."

xXx

"You look like you, but you don't," Danny muttered as he followed Tucker down the winding roads of the cemetery, floating along where his friend was walking, having turned down taking the aerial route. "I can't believe you got them that fast."

"That's what happens when they do the grinding in the office instead of having to ship the lenses in from somewhere else," Tucker explained as he self-consciously adjusted the new glasses where they sat across his nose. "Do they look bad? Because you keep staring at them."

"No, no," Danny answered quickly. "They just look… different. They look good. Your girlfriend from college isn't going to be able to keep her hands off of you."

Tucker flushed. "She's not my girlfriend."

"Right," Danny drawled knowingly. "I remember saying the very same thing about Sam many, many times. And look where it got us."

"She's not your girlfriend."

"That's a technicality," Danny said, forcing the euphoria he was feeling over the possibility of Sam being alive to beat back the uncertainty and fear of what he was about to do. "When we get this dealt with, it won't be a technicality anymore."

"Uh-huh. Sure." It was Tucker's turn to be skeptical.

"Alright," Danny admitted. "So maybe I was thinking that girlfriend would be a little weird." He watched as Tucker rolled his eyes and then said, loud and quite clear, "I was thinking wife was a better thing."

Tucker stopped dead in his tracks sending Danny plowing into him and the both of them falling to the ground with matching thuds. "You were really going to ask her to marry you?" Tucker asked as he scrambled back to his feet and checked his pockets to make sure nothing had fallen out or broken.

Danny shrugged as he lifted back into the air and floated once more. "I love her. I can admit. I figured the logical next step was convincing her that we should get married."

Tucker rolled his eyes as he dusted himself off, almost relieved to hear Danny talking like Sam was alive. It made him more confident in what they were doing, raised his own hopes, even though he was absolutely positive that he was right, that Sam wasn't in that coffin and that she was alive. Even if underneath it Tucker could hear the edge of desperate hope in Danny's voice, the sharp way he was refusing to contemplate the fact that Tucker might be wrong, that Sam might actually be in that coffin.

He stopped walking abruptly, feeling the chill as Danny phased through him and shivering at it. "Warn a guy next time," he heard Danny mumble as they both stared down at the dark headstone in front of them.

"I saw what you did," Tucker said softly as Danny turned red and rubbed the back of his neck, muttering something about ghosts and fighting before Tucker managed to cut him off. "Not that," he clarified. "What you did for her."

"Oh," was all Danny said as he knelt in front of the stone and ran shaking fingers over Sam's emblem where he had melted it into stone. "Tuck, I don't know about this."

"Let me show you what happens when I spell the coffin before you change your mind," Tucker said into the silence that followed. "If that doesn't convince you, we'll go home and forget about this."

Danny nodded and waited, watching as Tucker again summoned a bobbing witchlight to his shoulder with murmured Latin, and pulled a small vial from a pocket, uncorking it and letting the contents trickle to the ground above Sam's grave. "Monkshood, nettle, oak sap. Lemon verbena, coriander. One of her hairs," he said quietly as it saturated the ground more thoroughly than such a small vial should have been able to.

What Tucker said—sang—next Danny didn't recognize or understand, knowing it for the spell as faint trickles of light danced at his fingertips and dropped to the potion before fading into the ground as Tucker stopped, opened his eyes, and looked at Danny evenly. "Now, we wait."

It wasn't long, a fact that Tucker could attribute to the fact that the spell had been run once before and the residual effects of the original casting was giving the new casting feedback, but as a wispy shape rose from the ground he watched Danny step back startled, and let the witchlight at his shoulder dampen down so that they could see the image echoed clearly.

And he wasn't surprised when he heard the startled gasp from Danny as he realized that, if the spell was true cast, _the coffin was empty_.

"She's not in there," Danny murmured, and before Tucker could say anything the halfa was gone in a flash of brilliant light, already sinking beneath the ground, hope shining on his face as his head sank past the surface of the earth.

"Well fuck me," Tucker muttered. "This could be bad."

Moments later the coffin started rising up from the ground and Tucker's stomach twisted at the sight of it. It wasn't much changed than when it had gone down, just reflecting the dark night, and Danny appeared next to him, agitated and showing it. Gloved hands moved over the surface of the coffin and Tucker sighed as he reached a hand out and grabbed Danny's shoulder, squeezing, reassuringly at first and then harder, waiting for the ghost to turn and look at him.

"You don't have to be here when I do this," he offered, and Danny shook his head. Tucker nodded, understanding, and murmured a spell of opening, almost wincing as he heard the various locks on the coffin lid unsnap with clicks that were far too loud in the silence of the cemetery.

"You know way too much," Danny said quietly as they both reached out to lift the upper half of the lid. "On three?"

Tucker nodded and let Danny count it out, raising up on three and feeling tears flood his eyes, trickle down his cheeks as he looked in. he looked away, closed his eyes, and looked back again to make sure he wasn't seeing things, that his eyes weren't playing tricks on him, and he let go of the lid to tug his glasses off and wipe his eyes roughly. Next to him Danny was on his knees, hands buried in his face, back in his human form, hot tears stinging skin.

Finally Tucker found his voice and dropped down next to Danny, pulling him into a tight hug that Danny returned fervently. "It's empty."

xXx

"Is she alive?" were Danny's first words when they reached the safety of Tucker's room, nearly shouted as Tucker made a slashing motion for him to shut up. Danny winced as he realized how loud he had been, and how late—early—it was. "Sorry, I'm sorry, but is she?"

"I don't know," Tucker said as he dropped onto his bed and lay back, tugging his glasses off to rub his eyes. "I really don't know, Danny, but I think she might be."

"Tucker," Danny started and stopped. Tucker cracked and eye as he slid his glasses back on and watched as his best friend rubbed the back of his neck and then scrubbed both hands across his face as he sighed.

"Danny, this is me here. You can tell me anything," he said quietly as he watched whatever battle Danny was fighting wage war within him.

"I know. It's just… Something really weird has been going on lately, and I don't know what." Tucker tensed at this, knowing that this could be the proverbial nail in the coffin if he was dead on in his suspicions though, and Tucker knew full well, it was getting beyond deniable that Danny was being manipulated. Except that it looked like Danny was trying to break free of whatever was influencing him.

Danny rubbed his face again, trying to suppress the ache that was building unbearably behind his eyes. "Do you have anything for a headache?" he asked as an especially sharp throb nearly brought tears to his eyes. "I can't think through this."

"Your head hurts?" Tucker asked surprised.

Danny nodded, feeling queasy with even that slight movement. "It's getting worse. A lot worse."

Tucker narrowed his eyes as he got up and headed for his desk, shoving the chair at Danny who collapsed into it gratefully as Tucker opened a drawer and dug out a bottle of aspirin. "Here," he said, opening the bottle and handing it to Danny. Tucker grimaced as Danny chucked four into his mouth and dry swallowed them, grimacing himself at the taste, and Tucker took the opening while he had it.

Danny had always had fairly strong mental walls, things he had developed against the pressure of life while he was splitting himself between two worlds, but Tucker had known how to get past those for years. This time he had waited for the chance to get past whatever enchantments Danny was acting under, enchantments that Danny was apparently actively trying to fight off if the way he had suddenly turned ill when he had tried to talk to Tucker about the weird things. Weird things that Tucker now knew without a doubt related to whatever mess Danny was in, up to his neck, and Tucker just knew that his succubus assumption was right.

It was strong, the glamour on Danny, and Tucker felt beads of sweat break on his brow as he forced magic into Danny's distracted mind to try and break it. It was weakening as Danny continued trying to fight, because Danny truly did want to talk to his best friend about whatever problem was in his mind, but not enough, and Tucker arrowed a sharp spear of power at it, searching for the weak spot. Even then it wasn't enough, not nearly enough, but the glamour was chipped, cracked, and with the pressure Danny was placing on it the cracks were becoming seams, ready to burst the more he tried to talk.

"So what's the problem?" Tucker asked Danny, eyes still closed and focused on the spell that wreathed his friend. _There,_ he thought to himself as he heard Danny struggling to find words, fighting as hard as he could against the pain, against the spell, and Tucker hammered it watching as the seams suddenly split apart and the shell of the spell flew back, dissipating into nothing the moment they were separated from Danny.

Between watching it and the effort of breaking it, Tucker could only blink in confusion as Danny finally said what he had been trying to say.

"I almost slept with Charlie."

"You…what?" Tucker asked, having fully expected Danny to say that he _had_ slept with Charlie because, if Tucker was right, and he had been so far, Charlie was the demon in question. Which meant that Charlie was much weaker than Tucker had initially thought, and that made no sense, or Danny was much stronger than Tucker had thought, which still made no sense.

He blinked. Or maybe it meant that Charlie was working around something that was a natural repellant to succubi if the texts he had studied were true: love. Normally, Tucker would have been ecstatic by the well timed realization, but there was no way he could be until it was resolved and Charlie sent back wherever she had come from. And Danny was helped, because he needed help, Tucker realized as he turned his attention back to his friend.

"I know. I know," Danny said miserably as he buried his face in his hands, looking much smaller and weaker than Tucker knew him to be. "I didn't want to, I didn't even mean to. But it's like one second she was talking to me and the next she was…" Danny broke off shaking his head and turning helpless blue eyes on Tucker. "Something is wrong, Tucker. I can feel it. But I can't find it to fix it."

"Dude, it's alright. I'll help you." Tucker reached a hand out to Danny. "Tell me what's going on and we'll find a way out of it."

Danny nodded and closed his eyes as he started telling Tucker everything. Everything and anything, he amended as he spoke. The memory lapses, the way that some times when Charlie would kiss him, he would think that he was kissing Sam again. How sometimes even just thinking of Sam was impossible, between the headaches and the way he could hardly remember her name sometimes.

The way Charlie had tried to seduce him the night before, and how he had just… gone along with it. Willingly, even, until something snapped in his head and he thought his world was ending again. And Sam. Seeing Sam. Touching her, talking to her.

"She said she needed help, that I have to find her and help her." Danny closed his eyes against Tucker's prying green gaze. "She sounded really desperate, Tuck."

He cracked an eye to see Tucker nodding. "Alright, she needs help, we give her help."

"So how do we find her?" Danny asked.

"Leave that to me," Tucker answered grimly, knowing that he had a way, he just had to find it. "We'll find her, we'll save her."

Danny nodded. "I think she's alive," and was relieved by Tucker's nod of agreement. "But Tuck, we have to hurry. Wherever she is, I don't think she's got a lot of time left."


	12. Chapter 12

Beneath the Surface

12

_She was going to kill him. Slowly, painfully, dragging it out until he _begged_ for death._

_She had made her move, come to the decision that it was time, that she would invest all of the power she had recouped, could drain from any source she had, including the spelled shield that kept the witch trapped. And he hadn't been in his bed. In fact, he hadn't even been in the godforsaken house._

_He'd been gone, missing, and hadn't come back until the sun was well in the sky and stayed only long enough to reel off a pretty little practiced apology to herself and then bolt out again with the promise that it was an emergency with his little mage talented friend, and that he would be back in a day or so. The stupid, foolish, imbecilic human._

_She was going to kill him._

_Charlie closed her eyes as she willed them back to the sunny blue they were in her human form as she clenched her fingers until blood ran from the crescent cuts in her palms. It helped to calm her, clear her mind so that she could exert full control of her desire for revenge. The anger was still there, simmering rage, but it would wait. She needed him alive. She had to have him alive for the plan to work, so that it, and her chance at immortality, wouldn't be wasted._

_She needed him alive._

_She opened her eyes to smile darkly into the mirror. She needed him alive, but only until she had sex with him. After that… She smiled. After that, she could kill him._

xXx

Silence reigned as Danny and Tucker lounged in his room. The sun was obscured by clouds passing over it as the sky continued to darken in anticipation of rain. It would be the second time since Sam had died, since Sam had been buried, and Danny couldn't help but wish that it wasn't going to. But the aching, gnawing pain that had lived inside him for weeks wasn't as strong as it was. No, not now, not when he had hope, real hope, that Sam was alive.

Which was why Tucker had a thick book that was more than a little familiar to Danny stretched across his lap as he ran one sure finger down scrawled lines of unintelligible language, mouth moving every so often as he absently pushed his glasses back into place from the tip of his nose, where they kept falling as he scanned the spell for what Danny was sure the thousandth time since showing up at Danny's house that afternoon, eyes dancing as he told Danny he was sure he had the answer.

He closed his eyes and scrubbed a hand across them trying to get rid of the weariness he felt. He hadn't slept since they had made their midnight run in the graveyard the night before. He'd been kept far too busy between his family, Charlie, and the ghosts that seemed to think that Danny had all the time and energy in the world to suddenly focus on bouncing them back into the Ghost Zone.

He'd had to let the slack fall somewhere. It had fallen on Charlie, but the guilt that tried to eat at him disappeared as Tucker looked up with a sigh, a roll of his neck and shoulders, and tugged the glasses off. "I'm sure that this is what we need," he said with a wide yawn.

"It'll tell us is she's alive or not?" Danny asked, trying to hide the eagerness in his voice.

Tucker shrugged. "More or less."

"What is that that supposed to mean?"

"It's like this," Tucker explained. "We cast the spell. Okay," he corrected after Danny's skeptical stare. "_I_ cast the spell using Sam's hair as a catalyst. The spell, when I finish and set the spell loose, it should show us what Sam would look like if it were still on her head."

"That's all?" The disappointment was loud in Danny's voice.

"It's not an exact science. I _think_ that's what it does. It's either that, or it transports what you're searching for to you. Kind of like a shade."

"A shade?"

Tucker sighed and closed his eyes. Danny wasn't stupid, or even very dense anymore. But _oh_, how he wished that Danny actually knew a little more about magic and the workings of it. "A shade is like what we saw of the coffin. An echoed image. But if Sam shows up as a shade she should be able to talk with us and tell us where she is." He shrugged. "Either way it'll work. If it shows us that she's alive and nothing more, I've got a dozen locator spells that I can tweak to hunt Sam down. We'll find her, Danny. one way or another."

Danny nodded, reassured by the sure and authoritative tone Tucker was using. "You know I trust you, Tuck. I just…"

"Me, too. Me, too."

"Okay, so what do we have to do?" Danny asked as he sat forward, elbows to knees and hair dropping into his eyes before he pushed it back impatiently.

"We have to find a Wild Wood," Tucker said carefully. "Capital letters. It needs to be untouched, no cold iron. Nothing that could interfere."

Disbelief crossed Danny's face. "You mean to ask the fey, don't you?"

Tucker shrugged uncomfortably. "Sort of. It's not asking, but this kind of magic in a Wild Wood is just going to be begging for someone to come and see what it is."

"This is a very bad idea," Danny muttered as he leaned further forward and let his eyes roam the pages of cramped handwritten Latin. "This is even worse than me going into the Fenton Portal."

"Do you have a better idea?" Tucker asked, annoyed. "It's not like I've come up with anything that's going to work much better than this."

Danny shot Tucker an apologetic smile and sat back again, raking a hand through his messy black hair. "Alright. Fine. Tonight. We do it tonight. I'll come pick you up after sunset."

Tucker nodded and closed the book, tucking it back under his arm as he stood and tilted his head from side to side, groaning in relief as several loud pops were heard as his vertebrae cracked and realigned. Danny shuddered. "That sounded just like someone's neck being snapped."

Tucker rolled his eyes. "Right, because you would know what that sounds like." The stony expression on Danny's face cut Tucker's sarcasm off and he bit back the automatic desire to question his best friend as he headed for the door, Danny following him silently down the stairs. Some things were just better left unsaid, and besides, no one actually needed to know every last detail of Danny's ghost fights but Danny himself. And if not knowing where Danny learned what a breaking neck sounded like drove Tucker insane, he'd have to live with that.

They'd made it to the front door before delicate footsteps came from the kitchen and both men looked over to see Charlie smiling openly at Danny, scarce disguised lust in her eyes, and Tucker nearly gagged at the force of the desire that radiated off of her. If he'd had any suspicions before about Charlie and her role in Danny's sudden insanity, it was gone and dead now.

Not that it did much good, he realized as he glanced at Danny, expecting to see the previously alert blue eyes glazing over with a cloud of seduction wreathing him. But it wasn't there, it wasn't anywhere, and Danny was shifting from foot to foot uncomfortably as he stared at Charlie with a pasted on grin.

"You weren't up for breakfast this morning," Charlie said. "I thought maybe we could go and do something, like breakfast for dinner." The pheromones were almost thick enough for Tucker to see, and he wondered how Danny couldn't, except Danny was just so completely unmagical. Tucker could bounce spells at him, off him, _through_ him for as long as the day was blue, but it wouldn't make Danny feel the magic of them. He was almost a complete magical null.

But still, he should have been affected. And he wasn't. Tucker smiled at Charlie, tight and unpleasant, but a smile nonetheless as he realized that when he had snapped the glamour that had twined itself around Danny the night before, he had broken the conduits that fed the magic and spell work into Danny. they were still there, were still able to be used, but not for something like this.

The confusion on Charlie's face as her seduction glamour failed was priceless, and even more hilarious when Danny turned her down flat. "I've already got plans, Charlie. Maybe tomorrow."

And like that, Danny was following Tucker out into the overcast weather, glancing up and thinking that the rain would start soon, and maybe rain was a good omen for what he and Tucker were planning on doing that night. After all, Sam had first shown up to see him when it had been storming. Maybe if it were storming again she'd come back, alive and whole, and he wouldn't have to worry and be afraid anymore. The tight knot of tension and fear in his stomach would melt away and leave him in peace.

But first, to find Sam.

"Tonight. Right after sunset," Danny reiterated as Tucker opened his car door and laid the book down carefully on the far seat after sliding in.

"Come hell or high water," Tucker answered with a determined frown as he closed his car door and cranked it up, backing up and driving off as the downpour suddenly started, soaking Danny to the skin within minutes, and leaving him with wet cotton plastered against his body.

_Yeah,_ he thought. _Come hell or high water, I'm getting her back._

xXx

Irritation best described what Danny was feeling as he watched his best friend where he crouched in the middle of the clearing. They had flown for more than three hours to find an untouched forest that would have places that could be labeled Wild Woods, and Danny was fairly sure that they had gone far enough north to have crossed over into Canada. Despite the fact that it was summertime, he was still cold and shivering as he waited, shifted back into his human form and sick with anxiety for the outcome of the spell.

In fact, the only things that had been said since Danny had landed them in the glen were when he'd asked tucked why he was still going over the spell. Tucker had mumbled something off about pronunciation and cognation and had shoved his face right back into the grimoire without another word. But now he was standing, the witchlight at his shoulder winking out and leaving them in the bluish white light of the moon.

"_Suppeditasne?"_ Tucker asked Danny, and he raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"Um, English, Tuck. Don't speak Latin. Or any other dead languages for that matter." Of course there was always the mental not that learning a dead language or two might prove entertaining.

Tucker had the grace to toss him a sheepish smile before saying again, this time in English, "Are you ready?"

Danny nodded once, curtly, and watched as Tucker knelt down, the book tucked on the ground behind him and either not needed or forgotten for the moment. In Tucker's case, Danny knew it was probably both, and he watched as Tucker Megan to murmur softly in Latin, too low for him to hear what was being said. But the results of whatever he was saying were visible from his fingertips, like little pieces of starlight drifting from fingertip to the vial Tucker had pulled from his pocket and laid on the ground, uncapped.

More hair, Danny knew, Sam's, and Tucker was frowning in concentration as he kept murmuring and the magic turned darker, more purple and red and angry as he kept on, then finally stopped falling as Tucker stood and held a hand out flat, palm down over the spelled hair.

"_Date ego ipse me,"_ Tucker said clearly, and Danny watched as this time there was no visible magic except for the fact that the glass vial shattered with explosive force, and the hair, limned in a pale yellow white glow, rose up to flat before Tucker. Danny realized that it was roughly chin level with him, and in perfect place to be if Sam had been standing right there in front of them and it had still been attached.

And then the glow went out like it had never been, and Danny shivered more violently as darkness seeped into the clearing and snaked around him and Tucker. He found himself locked into place as Tucker's head whipped around, eyes searching, his glasses nearly flying off as he finally laid eyes on the intruders. Tall, slender, slim, even. Creatures that Danny had studied at school, even if it was only in passing, and there was no telling how much of it was accurate beyond the absolute basics.

Fey. Immortal, inhumanly beautiful, and far more powerful than Tucker was.

He tried to break through whatever it was holding him, but the fight was useless, even when he tried to shift to ghost form and break free. Neither worked, whether human or ghost he was still trapped, and he bit back the need to shout at Tucker to run, to get somewhere safe. He couldn't bear the thought of something happening to Tucker while he dealt with the lords of faerie, knowing that they practiced semantics as a way of life, and had mastered the art of saying one thing, and meaning another—all without lying, for that was one thing that was a truth. The fey were incapable of lies.

Certainly they made up for it with their silver tongues, glib and deceptive and dancing around whatever words passed between them and anyone with whom they happened to speak.

And when they spoke, their voices rolled melodic and sibilant across the silence of the wood. "By what right do you cast this spell? It has not been cast in many a mortal year."

"Fey of the Wild Wood," Tucker murmured as he glanced back at Danny, realizing that Danny was trapped where he stood outside of the sphere of the magic's influence. _"Emendatene?"_ The Latin tripped easily from Tucker's tongue as he turned back to the willowy creatures.

The lead creature, a slim woman who certainly towered of Tucker and Danny, tall as they both had become, tipped her head forward in an approximation of a bow. The sibilant, "Yes," echoed through the glade. Then the flash of silvery purple eyes, edged in brilliant, brilliant green as she asked again, "Why do you cast this spell?"

Tucker's eyes narrowed. _"Refertne?"_ he asked, unsure of whether the fey were planning to interfere or were only curious at the use of the spell. He was beginning to think it was the former, given their insistence at his response, and the way the darkness seemed to thicken as he only received a sharp nod in reply.

They wanted an answer. Tucker glanced over at Danny, wondering if the fey could read the answer written on every line of his friend's body. He could hardly feel right saying he cast the spell for love, but that's what it was. His love of his best friends, and his best friends' love for each other. Not that they didn't care about Tucker, he knew they did, but it wasn't the same. Much to his relief, because as much as he adored Sam… He'd been on the receiving end of her boots one too many times to ever think of her romantically.

But when he turned back to the slender fey he could see amusement and approval in every smile hey gave him, in the amused laughter that rang through the glade as darkness retreated and the moonlight filtered back through. Another glance at Danny showed that Danny was moving, wiggling his fingers and sending wary looks at the fey who still stood there watching both mage and hybrid.

"He loves her?" the woman asked, and Tucker smiled.

"_Etiam. Valde."_

And then Tucker had blink in surprise as the woman shifted from her perfect and accentless English to the Latin he had been using. _"Pericolosum est."_

Tucker closed his eyes, trying to ignore the thrill of fear at the warning. _"Scio."_

The woman glided forward, away from her companions, and held out slim hands, taking Tucker's and running slim fingers across his skin. The difference wasn't lost on Tucker; his dark very mortal skin, and the pearlescent sheen of her so pale hands as she touched him. He raised his eyes and looked at her, swallowing unconsciously as he realized that this woman, this fey, was possibly as old as time itself. And yet she was still standing there, touching him, and not smiting him for having the audacity to dabble in mage craft, ridiculing him for his imperfect Latin, his very humanity.

"_Dic mihi quod te memiresse,"_ she asked softly.

Tucker closed his eyes, knowing that it was a test before the magic was either released back into the spell, or released into the wood around them. There would be no second chance to convince these creatures that he meant well, that he wasn't trying to disrupt the balance of life and death. He was only trying to save his best friends. Both of them.

"She's my friend," he whispered painfully, then opened his eyes to see the fey, all four of them, the woman included, standing on the far side of the glen and beginning to fade out as the magic swarmed the hair and began to shimmer and shine in front of Tucker's eyes.

The spell was working, it was continuing from the very place it had been stopped. Tucker could only watch as they faded, and felt Danny come up next to him as he whispered, _"Grates."_

And winced as Danny's fingers wrapped around his wrist and squeezed. Two sets of green eyes stared, jade green at the shell shocked man standing next to him, and ghostly glowing green at… absolutely nothing. Danny was staring at nothing like it was the most important thing in the world, fingers clenching into his skin. Tucker wrenched his arm away from Danny, rubbing the bruised area carefully as he stared consideringly at his friend, who was moving towards where Sam's hair had been floating. The ghost had gotten a lot stronger. He'd known that, but he hadn't actually seen a real display.

The bruises that stood out black against his already dark skin told Tucker all he needed to know.

"Sam?" Danny whispered as he reached a hesitant hand out to stroke the nothingness. His face twisted and he murmured, "You can't talk anymore, can you?"

"Danny, who are you talking to?" Tucker asked evenly, wondering if Danny had come completely unhinged, or if there was something that he was missing completely.

"Sam," Danny said as green eyes shot back to Tucker, surprised. "You can't see her, can you?" Tucker shook his head and Danny gave a strangled laugh. "So what? This means she's dead?" He turned back to where he said Sam was standing, hands draped for all the world as if they were on her shoulders, being supported. "Sam. Oh, Sam."

"Wait." Tucker's voice rang out through the clearing and he took the first step toward Danny and… Sam. He had an idea. A though. A hope. He reached a hand out, tentative, careful, and closed his eyes wondering if he was losing his mind, or if for once, his brain had put the pieces together without telling him. He got his answer as his hand smoothed along something solid, and he realized that it was skin.

Cool skin, but not cold, and that it was an arm. Tucker's eyes flew wide as he slid his hand down to the invisible wrist and wrapped fingers around it much more carefully than when Danny had wrenched his own. A pulse; there was a pulse.

"Danny," Tucker said thickly as he stared at nothing. "She has a pulse. I can't see her, but she has a pulse." He watched numbly as Danny pulled Sam against him and broke down into sobs.

xXx

"I think I've got it figured out," Tucker said into the quiet of Danny's room as the sun started to rise, arrows of light angling through Danny's window and lighting up the darkened place. "It's not even complicated. Just… I think it's a sneak attack."

There. He'd said it, or come as close to saying it as he could. Tucker knew that he had to tread carefully. No matter that Danny seemed to be out of Charlie's influence for the time being, he had no idea what safeguards were in place against Danny finding out the truth, or even just speculation. It made it more difficult, Tucker knew. He had to tell Danny what was going on, but he couldn't even let slip that he was sure that it was Charlie.

In fact, that he was more than sure. He knew without a doubt now, because he had taken the liberty of running a spell while Danny had been changing in his bathroom, while Tucker was changing in his room. It was the quickest change of clothes Tucker had ever made, and he was positive that it was the quickest spell he'd ever cast. But time had been of the essence.

It came down to a count of humans in the house. There should have been five. Jack, Maddie, Jazz, Charlie and himself. Danny didn't register; the spell didn't consider him a true human because of his ghost half. But the reading Tucker had gotten had returned a count of four. There were four humans. And Charlie wasn't one of them.

"You're not making any sense, Tucker." Danny's voice was tense, tight with worry. Any of the momentary relief he had found in knowing that Sam was alive had long sense fled as he had realized that logistically, finding Sam and restoring her was going to be a nightmare. Especially considering that she was dead and buried to the rest of the world.

And never mind that there had been a body to embalm.

"Think about it, Danny. What's the best way to screw around with you? Topple you off balance so that you're not ready for a fight?"

Danny closed his eyes. "Going after the people I care about most."

"Which would be Sam." Tucker rolled his eyes at Danny's annoyed glance. "Face it, Danny. You and Sam have always been crazy about each other; you've admitted as much yourself. So it went after Sam."

"Why didn't it actually kill her?" Danny asked as he stood, stretched, and then went to pull his curtains closed, sending the room back into a semi gloom that was easier on both of their tired eyes.

"I have a theory, and knowing Sam, I'd say it's probably better than just a theory." Tucker rolled his shoulders until the right joint popped, then grimaced as the twinge shot through before continuing. "I think that whatever attacked her, took her to where she is, that she willed a death curse onto it."

Danny arched an eyebrow and Tucker shrugged. "It's like a coup d'état. The final thing. Anyone who can work magic can do it. But Sam has that finely tuned sense of revenge that would let her actually carry it out."

Danny smirked. "That does sound like Sam. So because she did that, they don't dare kill her, right?"

"More or less. I think."

"Then where is she so that I can go find her?" Danny grumble.

"Yeah, about that," Tucker started and blinked as Danny's eyes flashed green. "That's exactly what I mean, Danny." All he got was a confused stare. "Every time you've seen her and I've been present, your eyes were green."

"So?"

"So I think she's in the ghost zone. She's trapped there, and when she projects herself here there's too much ectoenergy tainting it for anyone else to see. Ghosts, they'd see her. Like you do." It was close enough to what Tucker thought, if a bit less eloquent. He'd thought about it the entire flight back from the Wild Wood and the spell casting, knowing that Sam was there, and wracking his brain for an explanation.

It was the only one he could come up with, and it fit. Really fit, right along with the fact that Sam was using astral projection.

"You guys know how to do that?" Danny asked, and Tucker realized that he'd been talking out loud, his inner monologue failing because of fatigue.

He tossed a yawning but apologetic smile at Danny. "In theory. I've never tried, and if Sam has before, I didn't know. But she has to be doing that. It makes sense, just like everything else."

There was silence for a long time, and Tucker cracked an eye to see if Danny had fallen asleep. He was more than halfway to the dream world himself, he wouldn't blame Danny if he had drifted off. He'd looked exhausted ever since Sam had died—been kidnapped, he corrected with a relieved thought. He needed rest, and if he was taking it now, Tucker wouldn't complain.

But he wasn't. no, he was sitting in his chair staring at the wall blankly, like he had too many things on his mind to focus on any one for more than a few seconds before it was whirled away and he was trapped into another temporary thought. The frown that creased his face, though. It made Tucker worry, fears that were founded as Danny finally dropped his face into his hands, his shoulders heaving as he bit back frustrated tears.

"Who would do this?" Danny whispered. "Who would do something this horrible?"

_Charlie._

The name echoed in Tucker's mind, but he knew that he couldn't say anything yet. Not yet, not until Danny was able to hear it without being influenced by the magic's that still clung to him. Thin, much more thin than when Tucker had broken through them. But they were still there and building again. No. not yet.

Instead of answering, he temporized. "You have a lot of enemies, Danny. There are a lot of them that would like nothing more than to see you suffer, no matter the costs."

"So this is my fault," Danny said as he looked away.

There was nothing that Tucker could say to reassure Danny.

xXx

**Latin Key:**

**_Suppeditasne_: Are you ready?**

**_Date ego ipse me_: Give me myself.**

**_Emendatene_: Isn't that right?**

**_Refertne_: Does it matter?**

**_Etiam_: Yes.**

**_Valde_: Very much.**

**_Pericolosum est_: It's dangerous.**

**_Scio_: I know.**

**_Dic mihi quod te memiresse_: Tell me what you remember.**

**_Grates_: Thanks.**


	13. Chapter 13

Beneath the Surface

13

_Whatever had been done to him was wearing off. Despite the surprise at not being able to do so much as cast a glamour at the fool the night before, he had been easy prey in his semi somnolent state that afternoon, and she had been sated on enough energy that she was able to weave new glamour's around him._

_But they had fallen. She knew that they had fallen, they had back lashed on her painfully and violently, sending her sliding into darkness before she'd managed to even shield herself. There had been no reason, no clue, not a single thing to indicate to her why she had lost control of the magic that she had woven around him. In fact, and Charlie clenched her jaw at this, he had been so tightly wrapped that she had half expected him to show up at her door, half naked and begging for the chance to grace her body with his._

_She had even prepared herself for it, knowing as she did that his mind and, reacting to the state of it, his body were more than ready to seek physical relief and comfort. A long bath in scented bubbles, an aspect of humanity that she would not forgo once she was immortal. Sweet smelling lotions smoothed along skin, a dark colored scrap of silk that showed her human body to its best vantage; clinging across breasts, nipping in to emphasize her waist and then flaring back out to smoothly fall across the swell of hips._

_It had been perfect. It had been time._

_It had failed utterly; he was not in his home and had traveled far enough away that she couldn't draw on whatever was left of the links. In fact, if she was correct, the links between herself and the halfa had snapped completely. Something she might have considered a minor annoyance, but for the fact that in the last few days he had been slipping further and further from the sphere of her control._

_It was time. Beyond time. She needed to see the witch, and then the halfa would come to her bed, or he would die._

xXx

The candle that burned in Charlie's room as she laid down in her borrowed bed was bright and let off thick jasmine scented smoke as she settled. With a sigh she let go of her control for a breath of a moment, her form shifting suddenly to shining skin, long pale hair, and shimmering gold eyes. Before the molten eyes could blink her human form was back, slim, slender, and delicate. But the magic was set.

With a deep breath of the heady scent, Charlie closed her eyes and let the power wash over her as she slipped into dreams.

xXx

"_You're here," Danny breathed as he ran his fingers along Sam's arms, feeling gooseflesh dimple her pale skin as he pulled her closer to him. "I'm so glad you're here. I've been so afraid."_

_She laughed and slid her arms up around his neck, pulling him close for a kiss that made his blood sing. "You don't have to be afraid, Danny. I'm here for you. You're all I want. You're all I've ever wanted."_

"_I love you, Sam" he whispered as he nuzzled her neck, lips grazing sensitive skin and making her body shudder at it. He pulled back to stare into her eyes, the comfort and safety of the familiar lavender washing through him. He ran careful fingers over her cheek, letting it slide back through her hair. It was soft, soft and dark and he pulled a few strands forward over her shoulder, letting raven locks dress the pale skin as he looked at it._

"_You have a fetish for my hair," she murmured in amusement._

"_You wore it short for so long I never even wondered what it would be like," he said. He smiled, completely honest. "I liked it short, but I like it better long."_

"_Why?" she breathed as he brought his hands up to slide through her hair as she tilted it her head back, moaning softly as he fisted his hands in dark tresses, dipping his face down so that he could taste her throat._

"_I like the way it feels on my hands," he murmured against the smooth, pale line of her neck, lips rising to seek the curve of her jaw, kisses pressed before his mouth found hers again. "It's soft. And I like the way it looks on you."_

_A smile curved Sam's lips as she looked up at him. With a casual hand she drew the mass of dark hair around to fall across her shoulder, hiding the rise of her breast as it slipped across skin. "It really is a fetish," she said, pleased, as Danny's eyes darkened from their normally bright azure to a darker, stormier color, his breath coming fast as he reached out to trail a finger down the black fall of hair._

"_I have a fetish for you," he whispered and leaned forward to kiss her again. And just when his lips met hers he startled back, a flash of memory coming through him. Sam, dark hair wet and straggling across his arm. Cold, dead. Lifeless._

_He blinked at her and her eyes shifted worriedly. "Danny? What's wrong?"_

_A soft hand on his cheek, warm and alive. Danny's fingers wrapped around her wrist, the telltale pulse steady and strong beneath them. He rubbed a thumb across her skin before smiling, pushing the image away and pulling her to him again. "Nothing's wrong," he said firmly as he kissed her again, this time pulling her close and holding her tightly as the need built between them, and the sudden desire exploded into full fledged flames._

_Amidst the whimpering moan that rose in Sam's throat, Danny whispered, "I want you."_

_Amethyst eyes flashed for a moment as she pulled back to look up at him, trust in her eyes and loud on her face. She nodded, smiled, and reached out for him to let her hands slide across bare skin, marvel down the planes of his chest and dance across the myriad scars that he wore as hard won victories in battle. And when her fingers trailed the waistband of his pants he could only groan and nod as his own fingers fumbled with the straps of her black bra, struggling to untie them without knotting them worse._

_He jerked back suddenly._

"_Sam?" he asked hesitantly, only now understanding that it wasn't a bra she wore, simple black panties that traced the smoothness of her belly. A black bikini. It made his head ache to think about it, and he knew that he was forgetting something as he stared at her, watching for anything that didn't seem right._

_But it was fine, there was nothing wrong, and she reached a hand out to him, holding it against the side of his face, ice cold against his fevered cheek. "Are you alright, Danny? You look like you're sick," she said in concern._

_Danny shook his head. "I'm fine," but the ache in his head was worse now._

_He ignored it, ignored the niceties of lovemaking and phased the bikini top off of her without any preamble, pushing her back on the bed so that he was staring down at her, seeing the desire in her face, feel the way her hands skimmed down the skin of his back to catch at the waistband of his pajamas and push. He dipped down to kiss her, the sickening thud inside his skull worsening as he tried to see her eyes, knowing that he was looking for the beloved lavender._

_He couldn't find it, couldn't find anything but the sharp pounding, the flash of bright gold that made his head spin. "Sam," he gasped out as he felt her move beneath him, legs cradling his waist between them as he lowered himself again to kiss her, to kiss Sam, and the gold flashed again, and dark hair that lay across her pale skin shifted suddenly, for a moment, to ice-blond._

"_Sam," he said again, and she looked up at him, hair as black as night, skin as pale as the moon, and eyes as hot and burning gold as the sun._

The sheets were tangled around him, his pillows all on the floor, kicked off and tossed away. Sweat dotted his skin and when Danny pulled himself upright with a pained grown he realized that his hair was damp, and the bed beneath him drenched in it. A nightmare. Nothing more than a nightmare. But the pounding in his head was still there, was still getting worse as he tried to remember the dream.

Danny groaned and shifted, then gave up and stood completely, feet on the cool floor as he held his hands to his temples and tried to think, to remember. Flashes of gold, pale hair. Sam. The ache got worse, nearly sending him to his knees as nausea built in his stomach against the pain in his head. And then it snapped as Danny shifted to ghost and launched himself into the air to float above it.

He wiped at the sweat on his face with one gloved hand, and then at his upper lip where it tickled his skin, only to stare at the bright red stain on his glove. A grimace later as he rubbed his temple where the ache now receded, and Danny turned himself invisible and flew through his door to stop outside of Charlie's room, hesitating for a moment before phasing through it too. She was asleep; he wasn't sure what he had expected to find, but he knew he hadn't expected to find her asleep.

There was a half burnt candled on her nightstand, and she was relaxed on top of the sheets in a skimpy black negligee that left much more to his eyes than he would have though possible. There was no need for imagination with it, he realized as he blinked and tried not to blush.

But at the same time it was wrong. Terribly wrong, and he couldn't figure it out. It was there, on the tip of his mind, just waiting for him to know it. His nostrils flared against annoyance at his subconscious. If it was really trying to help it should just give him a call instead of making him try to figure it out. He drifted higher, prepared to go through the ceiling and then roof for a fly around Amity Park to clear his head.

That's when he saw it, a flash of darkness in the dark itself, and he dropped down to let a cold hand brush against Charlie's warm on. Realization and understanding dawned across his face, and Danny recoiled back as if he'd been shot with an ectoblast, staring at the slip of a girl who slept in his house at his invitation. Without another thought he darted through her door, then his own, stopping only long enough to make sure that it was locked and no one could enter without ghost powers or magic.

His cell was in his hand a moment later, his human hand as he shifted back to Fenton and let the shiver wash through him as he stared at the dark hairs in his other hand. He dialed Tucker's number, fingers flying across the keypad, and damn near growling when the technomage didn't answer on the first ring. His eyes sought his clock and he winced to realize that it was after three in the morning, but still he didn't hang up.

This was too important, and if he knew his best friend, Tucker would already have the answer.

A click, a grumble, and a cursed hello later Tucker was on the phone. "Dude, this better be good, or I'm going to make good on all of Sam's threats to make you full ghost."

There was no preamble, only a pause for breath as Danny stood still as stone at the foot of his bed and said into the receiver, "It's Charlie, isn't it?"

He heard Tucker breathe in sharply and then mutter a curse. "Yeah. Yeah, it's Charlie."

xXx

"She's one of the lilin," Tucker said as he dropped a thick book in Danny's lap, letting Danny slide his fingers along the side to the marked page and flip it open before continuing. "It's the old creation myth."

"Some people might argue the myth part, Tuck," Danny said with a raised eyebrow.

Tucker only shrugged. "I'm agnostic; I can call it a myth if I want. But anyway, before God made Eve to be Adam's slave," and Danny smirked again, wondering exactly how much of Tucker's thinking on that was his, and how much was polluted by Sam's. "He made another woman, the same way he made Adam, and he named her Lilith."

"And tell me something I don't know, Tucker." Danny patience was wearing thin, and the day wasn't even half over. He'd managed to let it go until almost noon, which gave Tucker plenty of time to roll out of bed and become coherent to things other than hibernating, but that hadn't helped him as he paced in his room and ducked all of Charlie's attempts to see him. He'd even stooped to phasing through the ceiling and hiding in the Op Center for more than an hour until he'd seen Charlie walking down the street to the park.

_Probably looking for her walking smorgasbord,_ Danny thought with a scowl. He'd been so stupid, so blind. How could he have missed it? The predatory way she clung to him, like she was warning off anyone else that he was hers. Only instead of making it a girlfriend thing, he was actually her dinner.

With an exasperated sigh Danny raked a hand through his hair as he looked up at Tucker, who was adjusting the rectangular frames of his glasses on his nose as he peered down at the open book on Danny's lap. "Look, Tuck. I know who Lilith is, what does she have to do with this? She was the mother of demons. Charlie is a succubus."

"According to Jewish mythology, succubi are the demons that Lilith mothered," Tucker answered evenly.

"And you're saying that Charlie is one of them, right?" Danny asked, trying not to look surprised, even though he knew that what Tucker was saying was true. Tucker nodded and Danny chuckled harshly. "So one of the descendents of Lilith want me dead. She's immortal, how the hell am I supposed to beat her?"

"I don't know." Soft, honest. Almost desperate.

Danny closed the book, dredging through his memory and trying to recall anything he'd ever learned about Lilith and the lilin. There was nothing for the latter, very little for the former. Truth be told, until Tucker had said the word lilin to Danny, he didn't think he'd ever heard it before. Lilith, yeah, he knew that one. Comparative religions in his first semester of his first year at UC-Davis. He'd aced the class, it'd been fairly easy to talk theology when ones mind was constantly analyzing and applying battle tactics.

Words were just a new kind of weapon that Danny had learned to use.

"I know about Lilith a little," Danny finally said. "But I don't know much about the lilin. Or anything at all, actually. It sounds familiar, but I think that's just because it's derived from 'Lilith' so… Fill me in, Tucker. It makes no sense to me."

Tucker pursed his lips before glancing at Danny, who was sitting in his desk chair, elbows on knees and hands covering his face as he slouched forward. He looked totally defeated, and Tucker sighed. "Tell me what you know about Lilith, and I think it would be easier for me to fill in the blanks."

His shoulders rose and fell as Danny took a deep breath and gathered his scattered thoughts. "Lilith, first wife of Adam, mother of demons. They're her children. They kidnap children, seduce men, and she has to make sure that a hundred of them die daily." Danny shot up straight and brightened for a moment. "You think I might get lucky and Charlie might be one of the ones she kills?"

Tucker snorted. "In the next couple of days? Not too damned likely. Continue," he ordered with a wave of his hand.

Danny flipped him a finger before settling back into the chair. "They can't go near anyone who has the religious talisman things. Crosses, crucifixes, David's star. That's really all I know, and at that I'm not sure what's true and what's just religious stuff."

Tucker nodded. "You did good, it's all true. At least as far as I've been able to tell from research. Time for the gaps to be filled." Tucker pondered his thoughts for a few minutes as Danny waited impatiently, then finally leaned forward and tugged the book from Danny's knees. "The lilin, the first children she created, are immortal. The only way they can die is for her to kill them," and Tucker shot a hand up as he saw Danny's mouth fly open. He knew the halfa was going to ask again how to kill Charlie if she was immortal, and he still had no answer.

"I said as far as I can tell, it's true. Doesn't mean it's set in stone. We can weaken her and get Sam back. Anyway, the only way one of the lilin die is for Lilith herself to kill them." He chuckled at Danny's sarcastic face. "Yeah, I know. We can't ask her, I'm sure. Or maybe we could… But we'll think about that later. The hundred that die daily are actually," and Tucker rifled on his desk, reaching past Danny for a moment before tugging out a sheaf of papers and thrusting them at Danny, "are the descendents of the lilin."

Danny blinked as he skimmed the papers in his hand and shook his head. "This is twisted. They can have kids? Little demonic soul sucking brats?"

Tucker shrugged. "Doesn't make them that much different from any kid I've ever been around."

Danny shot a crooked grin at Tucker. "We used to be little demonic soul sucking brats."

"If you ask Jazz, we still are," Tucker said on a laugh. It was picked up and some of the tension that surrounded them both leaked out as Tucker finally caught his breath, then his best friend's eyes. "We'll find a way. You know we will, Danny. We always do."

"This is my fault," Danny said bleakly, blue eyes meeting Tucker's green for a brief moment before he dropped them down to stare at his knees.

"How, exactly, is this your fault?" Tucker asked softly, in a tone that no one could mistake for anything but skeptical.

_She was here, wasn't she?_

Sam had known. She'd known when she'd come to ask for his help that Charlie had been there, they he had been with Charlie. She'd known, and she hadn't pressed the matter. Tucker had known, had been able to give a steady yes when Danny had called him long before dawn had begun to show its pale pink face. And he hadn't. he hadn't had a clue until now, and he'd been sharing a suite with the girl, the creature, the succubus for an entire year.

It made him disgusted with himself; it made him feel foolish, stupid, useless. Restless with anger until he had to stand and pace, his feet steady thumps as he walked the length of Tucker's room and back, muttering. "I should have known, Tuck. I should have fucking _known_. All of the signs, all of the symptoms were there. I _do_ know about succubi. I've got a fucking degree in it for Christ's sake."

"And you were also under a very powerful spell of seduction. Danny, there was no way you could have known." Tucker, ever the voice of reason.

Danny turned desperate, wild eyes on him. "I should have known! Sam suffered because of this!"

"Dude, you suffered too! Don't tell me you've forgotten all of it already. I know you haven't," Tucker said, his voice hard and sharp, cutting the barely healed pain wide open again. Danny gasped against the sudden hurt, the overwhelming anguish that he had carried since the day he had thought Sam died, his hand clutching at his chest until Tucker was there, forcing him to look at him.

"You knew, Danny," he said quietly, one hand over Danny's mouth to keep him silent as he tried to deny that. "You knew, somewhere in there you knew. You want to try and tell me you didn't? You off a spell from a powerful demon because somewhere you knew that it wasn't right."

"She's been gone for so long. It took me weeks and weeks…" Danny whispered brokenly.

Tucker nodded. "It's been weeks. And you could have died doing what you did, the way she had you wrapped around in spell work." He laughed harshly at Danny's startled eyes and nodded. "The blood? That was the spell. It was pressuring you every time you tried to come out from under it."

Danny shuddered at the thought, but didn't deny it. At the time he'd felt like dying would have been better than the pain, but it wasn't a fact he wanted to think about. "Can she do it again?"

Tucker shook his head. "You broke it, you broke the power she had over you. Even if she does manage to do it again, and I think the odds are slim to none, you'll be able to slip out easier. You shouldn't have been able to, you know."

Danny gave Tucker a half hearted smirk before sinking down onto the bed. "Never did follow the rules. So what do we do?"

Tucker shrugged. "I vote we go hunting."

Danny smiled darkly. "You know, we don't really have to hunt. She'll come to me."

Tucker considered this. "You do have a point."

Danny smiled darkly. "Yeah. And when she comes to me, we'll be ready."

xXx

_All or nothing._

The words echoed around in Sam's head as she desperately leeched magic from the air around her, pulling in as much energy as she could before throwing it up against the barriers the damned creature had set between her and the Ghost Zone, between her and the rest of the world. She was desperate. Beyond desperate.

Danny was going to die. He didn't know what Charlie was, didn't know what she was capable of or even what she wanted with him.

With a frustrated scream Sam did it again, this time directing the power with her hands, slicing them down and trying to cut her way through the shield instead of hammering and bashing at it. Crushing force didn't work, maybe a little more finesse might. Another scream, this one more pained than angry as the attempt failed and she was thrust back by the recoil of power.

"Oh please," she whispered, closing her eyes and laying her hands against the barrier, feeling it tingle beneath her palms as she bit her lip to stop the tears that threatened to fall. "Please!" she shrieked as she pushed out through her palms, physical force and magical, pleading, praying that it would break.

It didn't so much as bend.

"_It's all or nothing now, little witch. Your Danny will fall. One way or the other._"

She gasped on a frantic sob as she threw herself at the barrier again. Nothing. Thrusting more power. Nothing. A spear, a hammer, a magically shaped ax. Nothing. She was trapped. She was trapped and Charlie was going for Danny and there was _nothing she could do_. Sam dropped to her knees in front of the barrier, eyes seeking a weak point, trying to find a better place to attack. There were none, the barely visible sheen of magic as smooth and uninterrupted as it had been before she'd started attacking it frantically.

Another desperate attempt, and she sent magic funneling down beneath her feet into the very rock that she had lived on for weeks. Chips of stone flew back and struck he, slicing into her legs, her outstretched hands and arms, red blood flowing faintly as the hole deepened, widened, enough that she could drop through it and escape the shield. Or could have if it hadn't extended all the way around in a perfect sphere, keeping her, trapping her.

"Oh god, Danny, please," Sam whispered as she collapsed next to the scorched and broken rock.

"_I'm going to have so much fun making him mine. And there's nothing that you can do to stop me."_

Sam closed her eyes against the anguish that flooded her. The bitch had been right. She was going to take Danny, she was going to kill him. And there was nothing Sam could do about it, no matter how hard she tried. The creature had left long enough before that by now she could be back, finding Danny, seducing him. Sam's eyes flew open as the image of Danny making love to Charlie flooded her mind, something she didn't want to think about much less picture.

He wouldn't go willingly. No, he'd fight. It wouldn't be like that horrible mental image. It would be wrong, and violent, and full of death and hatred and pain. It would be nothing less than rape, and Danny wouldn't survive it.

Sam climbed to her feet, swaying on them as she struggled to find more magic, trying to extend her will past the shield to draw energy from the atmosphere beyond it. Spots danced in front of her eyes as she prepared for another attempt.


	14. Chapter 14

Beneath the Surface

14

_I will not let it go this time. The thought was like fury raging through her veins as she slipped out of the Ghost Zone and back into the borrowed room she currently inhabited. It ended tonight, one way or the other. She would have him, willing or no, and she would eat his soul no matter what. Her eyes flared yellow as she considered what might make his emotions ripen and peak, providing her that much more energy to drink in as she took him._

_Perhaps she would reveal to him as she held him within her that his little witch, his true love, and she snorted at the clichéd phrase, was trapped in the Ghost Zone even now. Waiting, always waiting for him to come save her. She smiled grimly. No. he would be joining her; it was the only answer. He would join her as a full ghost, and she would join him not long after._

_Once the halfa was dead, she would make sure to take care of the little witch. Immortality would be a blessing and let her pay the human back for making her task more difficult, more miserable than it need be. Imagine, the nerve of the creature to call her by a mortal girl's name._

"_I will take his power," she said defiantly to her reflected human image as she stared into her mirror. "I will stop for nothing, whether I take him or not." She bit off the words, anger lining her eyes as she willed them back to the cornflower blue that belonged on the mortal girl Charlie instead of the succubus she truly was._

_A moment later a lovely girl with eyes like the sky was staring back at her, and she smiled, pleased. "Better. Much better." The pretty eyes narrowed and Charlie took a breath, nostrils flaring as she felt along the lines that bound her to Danny. They were so weak that they were almost nonexistent, and she frowned, running more power down them._

_He was in his room. Good. No time like the present, she decided. She closed her eyes and willed a tendril of power into the walls of his room, careful to add in boundaries for the floor and ceiling, confines that most spell casters forgot unless experience had been a harsh teacher. There would be no mistakes, there would be lost chances. Silence would reign. It would be so, and Charlie smiled as power fed into the walls, sheathing them in a sound proof casing that would hold until she let it down._

_She took one last glance back at the mirror and nodded. "I will take it all, and if it isn't enough, I will devour the whole damned town."_

_She would stop at nothing to achieve immortality._

xXx

"Dude, that's a little too lifelike," Danny muttered from the corner of his room where he crouched with Tucker, watching the facsimile the technomage had made sleep in his bed. It was hot and uncomfortable where they were; Tucker had cast a shield spell that involved blood and chalk and subsequently cut them off from the rest of the room.

A pocket of space where nothing could pass in or out, not even a breeze to cool them off as they waited, Danny human for the moment at Tucker's insistence. Something about the levels of ectoenergy within his active ghost form negating the concealment spell and possibly—probably—keying Charlie into the fact that the Danny sleeping in his bed was not Danny at all. In fact, _that_ Danny was not much more than a handful of mud, a few twigs and an earthworm.

Tucker snorted. "Should I have left out the bellybutton to make her wonder? Or maybe adding another arm, a third nipple, maybe, would have made you feel better."

Danny elbowed his best friend where he knelt, but gently. This was taxing enough already without picking fights, so Danny only sighed deeply. "It's really good, Tuck. You're good at this."

"I know," was all the reply that Danny got, and he stared at his friend with considering eyes. No, this was definitely not the techno geek he'd known in high school. This was a self assured, independent and self-sufficient man.

He sighed again and tugged at the collar of his shirt, a black long sleeved thing that he had worn on Tucker's recommendation. The request had been followed by a lengthy explanation that it was easier to blend like colors into shadow, which was why Danny's jeans were so dark they were nearly black, and he'd traded in his running shoes for black boots. Tucker had followed his own advice, mostly, with matching dark, dark blue jeans. His shirt, however, was a shade of red that was hardly ever found outside of vampire movies; the color of blood, rich and ruby red. Long sleeved again, and with a mocked turtleneck collar that barely snuck out from the tops of Tucker's true concession to the shadow walking spell. A black trench coat that fluttered at his knees when he moved.

He'd kept his beret, bright red, and his PDA flashed in the darkness as Tucker fiddled with it despite Danny's increasingly desperate requests for Tucker to please turn it off for just five minutes. It was a lost cause, Danny knew it, but still couldn't help but make the request. He was so bored that he was tempted to rip the gadget from Tucker's hands and play with it himself.

"She's coming; I just felt her snap a spell of silence around your room," Tucker said as Danny's current attempt to lose it fell on deaf ears as the gadget flickered once more. Then it was gone, whisked away to a pocket of the trench coat as Tucker pulled out a clear crystal strung on silver chain and balanced the book Danny had given him across a knee. The knob of Danny's door jiggled once, twice, and the turned as Danny fought to control the harsh glare as his eyes flashed green at the sight of Charlie standing in his doorway staring smugly in at the sleeping figure she believe to be the ghost boy she was after.

She was dressed for sex; there was no other way to term it. A pale rose scrap of material that fit her body like a glove, dipping low enough that her breasts were barely hidden, high enough at the hips to show the pale expanse of skin up to her waist. Lace across her flat stomach, pale and white between the rosy silk or satin. She smoothed her hands down her body from best to thigh, eyes hungry as she stared at the sleeping golem.

"Now?" Danny whispered so quietly that the question barely made it past his lips. Tucker's head shook sharply, his hand coming up to grab the ghost's arm before Danny could shoot out from their hiding place.

"Not yet," he whispered fiercely, trusting in the spell Charlie had laid over the bedroom to blend with his own and protect them from being revealed. "Let her do her thing; she'll expend energy, power. It'll be easier to find a way to stop her that way."

Danny's mouth gaped open as his eyes flashed back to blue and blinked several times. "You mean, let her seduce me? It?" He snorted. "Whatever. But that?"

Tucker nodded. "Trust me, it's our best chance."

Danny flicked his fingers at his friends. "Nah, you're just a voyeur." Tucker shrugged and Danny smacked his arm. "Make it believable."

Tucker grinned ferally. "Trust me, Danny." unfortunately, the way he'd said it made Danny less inclined to trust Tucker with anything right then.

But he didn't have much of a choice, and Danny let his gaze be drawn back to the succubus who was even now walking quietly to the bed, a predatory grin on her face as she drew a knee up to settled down on the bed, the other leg following so that she was prowling up its length like a jungle cat, blue eyes half lidded and dark as she drew alongside the golem.

True to Tucker's word, he was making it good, right down to the startled way the mock Danny shot up straight, eyes wide and more than a little freaked until it realized that there was no monster creeping from beneath the bed. No, only a half naked slip of a girl who was staring at him like he was the tastiest dessert in the universe. He responded in kind, and Danny grimaced, trying to watch as an outsider instead of feeling like he was watching himself in a very bad porn.

"Charlie?" he mumbled, eyes still blurred with sleep, and she nodded, making Danny blink slowly, confused, before his eyes widened as he realized what she was wearing. "What are you doing here?" he blurted, and shifted as the real Danny watched in acute embarrassment.

"I came here for you," was all the succubus said before moving forward to lean over the golem, pressing her mouth to his and pushing him back on the bed, hands stronger than expected against his shoulders. He shifted with her and Danny looked away, more than sure that he didn't want to watch as the mimic gave in to the seduction.

"Tucker," he hissed lowly, warningly as the other knelt with the crystal still dangling from his fingers as he watched. Tucker only shot a glance up at Danny and rolled his eyes before he turned back to the bed, watching and waiting. Resolutely Danny followed suit.

The golem had managed to roll Charlie underneath him and was trying to divest her of her of her clothing with fingers much more sure than Danny thought his own would have been if he'd been above the girl, looking down at her. He could only push that thought out of his mind as he felt Tucker tensing next to him, gradually, but surely. Readying himself for an attack.

It _was_ an attack of sorts, and Tucker was already more than a little tired as he held the golem together, keeping it fro shifting back to water, dirt and wiggling earthworms. On top of that he was being forced to control it, completely and utterly, unwilling to fuel a form of consciousness on it with a bit of Danny's blood. That might have opened Danny up to attacks from the succubus, even if it wasn't him himself that was in the middle of a very intimate moment.

She was powerful. Powerful enough to have begun draining power from Danny even in her human form while mounting a simulacrum. Better safe than sorry, and Tucker felt a bead of sweat slide down his temple to dangle from his jaw before dropping and dotting a damned spot on his trench coat. The crystal swayed and he focused his thoughts back through it, instructing the golem to take one of the thin straps of the negligee Charlie wore and slide it down her shoulder, trailing it with kisses.

It was what he would do.

He smirked in the darkness where Danny couldn't see him. It was what he _had_ done on a few occasions. Danny would flip if he found out that Tucker had told him what he wanted to hear to get the answers he needed. Another thread of will brought the negligee down to the succubus' waist, and Tucker could feel the glamour she radiated, power so thick that if he and Danny hadn't been safe behind the shield he had erected they would have suffocated underneath the weight of it.

The only safe one was the creature lying with her, hands sliding across pale skin that glowed more with each passing second as Charlie divested herself of her own power to ensure that she reached her goal. Tucker narrowed his eyes as he felt a new surge of power from Charlie, apprehension loud in the back of his head. She was powerful, maybe too powerful. Every time he thought she was tapped out she came up with yet another scrap of power to toss at the simulacrum.

He knew she'd been feeding when Danny wasn't easily accessible, and he knew that she most likely had power stored elsewhere. No doubt she had invested a great deal into whatever magics were keeping Sam trapped in the Ghost Zone, and forcing the unwilling silences whenever she tried to communicate. And even behind the shield with his best friend standing next to him, Tucker could feel the threads of broken power between the halfa and the succubus, reaching out and trying to reconnect with the severed end on Charlie's side.

A miracle that she hadn't noticed it yet. She would, there would be no stopping it if Tucker let it go much farther. She'd know the second she gave the golem entrance and tried to begin draining its life force. The best she could do was to come up with a handful of energy from the earthworms, and a mouthful of mud from the rest.

"Now?" The impatient voice from next to him as Danny held himself steady, wanting badly to go fight.

Tucker shook his head, looking over to see that Danny was balanced on the balls of his feet, ready to break through the spell that shielded them and attack the succubus. "Not yet."

"Then when?" came the harsh question, more like a growl than anything else.

"She'll decide when. I want to weaken her as much as possible."

And yet there seemed no true sign of weakening from the succubus, even as her fingers found the waistband of the sweatpants he had instructed the golem to dress in before sending it to sleep in Danny's bed. Tucker felt more than saw when Danny looked away, but Tucker stared resolutely, jaw clenched as he willed the simulacrum to take control of the situation and at least get _under_ the sheet that was scrounged at the foot of the bed.

"Tucker…" Strangled this time, and Tucker spared a moment of sympathy for his best friend.

"Now, Danny," Tucker whispered as he felt Charlie break through the golem with magic as she realized that, despite its appearance and willingness, it wasn't what she had thought it was.

"Now?" Danny echoed, surprise etched in his blue eyes.

Tucker nodded as the golem shattered into a shower of dirt, mud, pieces of earthworm dotting the muck as it flew across the room. He stood fluidly as he heard Danny's knuckles crack as his hands clenched into fists, and then Tucker allowed the barrier between them and the creature to drop, revealing the two of them, half ghost and technomage, standing there waiting.

Charlie lifted herself from the bed, blue eyes narrowed in anger, still flush from the attentions she had received, naked and nearly glowing. She stood there, picking a piece of twig from her hair almost casually as she turned to face them. She smiled, and it made Tucker shiver at the pure malice in it, though Danny was only made more angry at the sight.

In the space between one heartbeat and another Danny grabbed on to the power inside him that made him a hybrid and shifted to his ghost form in a bright white blue flash of light. Now green eyes blazing, he faced the monster down with a steady gaze, jaw knotted in fury.

Charlie smirked at him.

"Daughter of Lilith," Danny said darkly, feeling as the words were swallowed up by the spell of silence that Tucker had said Charlie had cast on his room.

She had indeed, the silence echoed as her eyes flashed at him, more angry now than they had been before. She smiled, baring her teeth as she did so. "Son of Adam," she hissed out, and Danny could only watch as her eyes shifted to yellow, her skin paled to a translucent pearl, her hair shot out from her skull even as it lightened to nearly white.

Taloned fingers, and Danny wondered how he could ever have been attracted to her; how he ever could have missed the fact that her humanity was stolen from countless moral lives she had taken and devoured. His fingers tightened more and his hands ached with the fists he'd made, letting ectoenergy flow through him and light them into blazes of sickly green ghost fire. He raised one to her, fingers out and beckoning as he plastered a lazy smile across his face.

"Come on, then," he said to her, and all hell broke loose.

xXx

Sam was breathing heavily and nearly unconscious by the time she gave in to the need for rest. She had no choice; even a single attempt further would knock her out, maybe kill her if she tapped into too much of her innate power trying to fuel a damned spell into strength enough to break through barrier. It was hopeless. Beyond hopeless, but she had to try.

Her lungs burned as her chest rose and fell, desperate for a little more air, a little more oxygen. Despite having done nothing physical Sam felt her entire body burning with the strain of exertion. _You'll never see a fat mage,_ she thought wildly to herself as she willed the pain away, knowing that it wasn't going anywhere at all.

Without a second thought Sam let her body collapse back against the cool stone, feeling it begin to numb her aching joints, seep into her throbbing skull and dull the pain that pounded in time with her heartbeat. Her eyes burned as tears pooled in them to trickle down her dust streaked cheeks, and she wiped at them furiously, despising the weakness that showed in the way her hand trembled. It was useless; she was trapped.

"I will not give in," the said softly, fiercely into the echoing silence around her. Another breath, and another, and another. "I will not give in," she whispered again, more softly this time, and closed her eyes letting her magic see for her. It ran across the barrier, turning it into a glowing yellow thing in her minds eye until it had circumvented the entire rock.

There were no weaknesses, and Sam bit back an anguished cry. Fatigue washed over her, and Sam let her eyes slip closed.

When she opened them again her entire body was cold, and she felt like the temperature around her had fallen by tens of degrees, leaving her covered in gooseflesh and shivering with a cold that had seeped into her bones. Her tears had dried on her face and she shot up frantically, noticing only that her body ached instead of screamed at the movement. A moments thought and Sam was arrowing a fine needle of magic at the barrier, willing it to fall so that she could warn Danny.

And in the back of her mind she wondered if she even needed to warn him. She'd slept, but for how long? Was it already over? Had Charlie already stolen his life? Because with the barrier still up, her own magic still helplessly, hopelessly trapped within the death curse that hovered around the succubus… She knew that Charlie still lived.

And the temperature fell again with an almost audible snapping of power through the soles of her feet.

With a muttered curse Sam dropped back to her knees, pressing her hands along the ragged ground and pushing a small trickle of power into it, looking for what had snapped. She found it; a shred of power left that she read as a crude warming spell, one that required far less power than some of the more sophisticated spells Sam had seen and practiced. But a shred, what was left after that minute amount had been withdrawn, bled away and then snapped.

Sam stood, eyes bright and brilliant as she looked at the almost translucent wall between her and the rest of the Ghost Zone. If the smallest spell had been used, then Charlie was spending her magic on the seduction. There was still time. And if Charlie was wasting the smaller spells, it wouldn't be long before the barrier wavered enough for her to break through.

It wasn't; she felt the pulses through the shield minutes later at most, and watched it carefully with a hastily laid spell of true sight, the ripples and wrinkles to the barrier growing more distorted with each pulse of power draining away. It made no sense to Sam, that Charlie would be using enough power to destroy all of her other spells just to seduce Danny, but a small part of her was terribly pleased with the fact that Danny must have been putting up a hell of a fight for the succubus to resort to such desperate measures to bring him to her bed. Or maybe she was just killing him slowly.

A new series of pulsed washed over the dome, making it flicker for several moments before it solidified again, and Sam smiled darkly as she began drawing in the ambient magic that had gather while she was unconscious. The barrier was falling, and when it did she would be ready. More than ready, if she had her way. If there was even the tiniest chance that Sam could do damage on Charlie she was going to.

When it fell Sam drew every last vestige of power she had gathered into a shining blade of magic, slicing it through the last vestiges of power and dropping to her knees as she sent her mind flying out to seek Danny. The pain of rock shards slicing in didn't faze her, only hardened her will to find Danny, to warn him if she could, help him if she was too late. Oh, how she prayed that it wasn't too late.

But the confusion that washed over her when she finally opened her eyes was almost blinding. Danny, darting and flying around his room with Tucker in the shadows of a corner, on his knees and frantically leafing through the book Danny had given him. It made no sense.

"Your left, Danny!" Tucker yelled, and Sam watched as Danny phased to the right only to have a shining lance of light smash into him when he solidified again. "No," Tucker said on a groan. "Your _other_ left."

Sam could only raise an eyebrow as she turned further to her own left and realized that it wasn't a ghost battle. Or at least, it wasn't Danny fighting against another ghost. No, it was Charlie, in her succubus form, pale skin shining and eyes glowing brightly as she sent another shock of power towards Danny, who nimbly split himself in two to let the attack fly harmlessly between the two of him.

A flash of blinding green energy flew from Danny's outstretched hands, blurring white as it burned into a renewed attack Charlie sent flying Danny's way, and Sam's heart lurched in her chest as she realized that Danny was being pushed back from it. He hit the wall and sagged against it, a hand to his side where green blood dripped, and Sam gasped as Charlie narrowed her eyes and smiled smugly at him.

"You can't even hope to beat me, child," she said haughtily over the gasping breaths he took. It was a good act, but Sam could see the way that Charlie's own shoulders were heaving, and she knew that this was where the power that kept her contained had gone to. To help Charlie overpower Danny, to beat him in a fight that would be to the death.

Danny launched himself from the wall and more ectoblasts surged from his hands. "A little help would be great, Tucker!" Danny shouted as everything he fired at Charlie impacted on a hastily formed shield inches in front of her. Danny tossed one of his own up and winced as two blades of light crashed into them, sending him skidding back through the air.

"Danny," Sam breathed as he turned himself intangible to save his legs from hitting his bed, a thing that would have sent him tumbling through the air with no way to defend himself against the still coming attacks.

Danny cried out as he was too slow to raise a new shield and more green blood flew from a sudden slash to his left shoulder. he brought his right hand up to cradle the wound, wincing as blood flowed past his white gloves to drip on the floor. "Tucker!" he shouted. "Come on!"

Tucker shot an angry glance up from where he was furiously paging through the book. "What do you want me to do?" he cried back, vehemence and worry mingled in his voice. "She's freaking immortal! Paper cut her to death?"

Then Tucker's jade green eyes took on a considering slant and stacks of paper detached themselves from every book and pad around the room, barring the one on Tucker's lap, and flew in spinning slices towards the succubus. There were hundreds, thousands, and Sam watched as they flew against yet another shield, then pushed a little harder and made it through to score hundreds upon hundreds of tiny cuts across the creature's glowing white skin.

Charlie screamed in rage and pain and Sam took a step forward, one hand out to try and help, but not sure what she could; the little power she had left after forcing past the shield and projecting herself all the way from the far depths of the Ghost Zone already fading more rapidly than she wanted to admit. Another howl of rage and the paper burned to cinder where the pieces protruded from across Charlie's body. Dam took a step back as the pieces of burnt paper flew off of her and Sam dusted it from her face and arms without thinking.

And then she blinked, the battle nearly forgotten as Danny called, "How do I kill her?"

"I don't know." Tucker's miserable response fell on deaf ears as Sam looked down at herself and realized that where her skin wasn't covered by the black bikini, it was covered by black ash. It was on her, _toughing her_, and Sam breathed a gasping, desperate laugh as her eyes flew up to her friends, to the man floating above her, glowing green eyes locked on to the succubus who was glaring up at him hatefully. The man who was the boy she had fallen in love with a long time before.

"She's immortal, Danny, we can't kill her," Tucker shouted into the melee. "We can only stop her."

Sam took a breath, stepped forward from the shadow she herself had been hiding in. The floor creaked beneath her and three sets of eyes flew to her, one an angry golden yellow, one a brilliant green that looked at her in worry and relief. And one bottle green blurred through the lenses of glasses. She held a hand out to her friends, and then waved the other at the succubus, letting a trickle of her own power fly and send stinging, searing heat along the cuts that already dripped with black ichor, marring the pale skin.

"Sam, get out of here!" was Danny's first response to her sudden appearance, and then she caught Tucker's head shaking back and forth.

"She's projecting, Danny. I can see her!" Tucker cried, surging to his feet, the spell book forgotten momentarily.

Sam closed her eyes. This made things so much easier if Tucker could see her. If his eyes could see, then his ears could hear, and then both would know the answer to their problem. A momentary smile as she gathered what little power she had left, and Sam knew that she was skirting dangerous territory as it began bleeding her own life away to fuel the words she screamed as Charlie prepared another attack, this time on Sam herself instead of Danny.

"_She's not lilin!"_

Within seconds Sam was back on her knees in the Ghost Zone, blood staining the rock immediately around them as her body wavered on the edge of consciousness for a long lingering moment. The sudden nausea that overwhelmed her and made her wretch emptily against the rock told her that she had overstepped her bounds, the blackness that seeped in from the edges of her vision told her that if she woke up, she was going to have the hangover from hell.

If she woke up.

Sam really hoped she did. It was the last thing she thought as the darkness claimed her.


	15. Chapter 15

Beneath the Surface 

15

_The meddling little witch, always interfering, and how did she escape from the Ghost Zone? Charlie's eyes narrowed painfully as she stared balefully at the girl, black ichor dripping from the wounds the mage gifted man had given her. She would deal with him in time, but she would deal with the witch now. And once the miserable girl was dead she would deal with the mage, and after that she would deal with the bloody halfa. _

_It was going to end badly. He had to die; there would be no attempt at getting him into bed and draining his energy and power in the properly thorough way. No. she would only take as much as she could while she fought him, and then she would go through the town of Amity Park like a demented angel, drinking and draining the life force from every creature there, be they man, woman or child. _

_And when she was done she would dance a bloody dance on the corpses of the three who dared defy her will. _

xXx

That they were shocked was to say the least. Sam was there, was with them, still dressed in the scrap of black bikini she had been wearing the night she had been taken—not died, never died—with her pale skin covered in sooty smears and streaks. Just appearing from a shadowed corner, the slight movement drawing the eyes of everyone. Charlie had been furious, it could be seen in the way her eyes had narrowed, her teeth had bared, like a rabid animal bent on destruction and death.

Danny had been terrified, the thought that he might lose her all over again rising up in his throat like bile as he yelled, "Sam, get out of here!" as Charlie writhed across the room from him, tiny streams of smoke rising from the hundreds of cuts in her skin as she growled in pain and rage.

And Tucker, on his knees, mouth hanging open and eyes wide behind his glasses as he shook his head slowly, not believing what he saw. And then the book being knocked to the side as he rose to his feet so quickly that Danny thought for a moment the other boy might fly. Not so, but tears blurred Tucker's eyes as he cried, "She's projecting, Danny." An exultant call. "I can see her!"

The fear in Danny's heart settled abruptly as he realized that Sam wasn't really there, it was what Tucker had called a corporeal manifestation of her mind. Or something like that; he never pretended to understand it. He only smiled and nodded along as Tucker explained things that inevitably went over his head. Not that he was stupid… But magic wasn't for him. Too complicated, not as cut and dry as ghost fighting, for all the tactics he had ever had to learn.

And the piercing scream that Sam had given, making Danny's heart nearly stop in his chest. "_She's not lilin!"_

He hadn't known what to make of it, had only had eyes for the peaceful look on her face as she disappeared to his own desperate cry as he dove for where she had been, forgetting what Tucker had said about her projecting, only knowing that Sam, _his_ Sam, had been there. And now she wasn't. The blade of light took him in his right side as he dove and Danny screamed as he flew into his wall, sending what remained of the plaster on it to the ground on top of himself as he curled in, one hand trying to push himself up from the floor as the other curled around to cup the wound the bled green so freely.

He groaned as Charlie herself screamed, more in pain now from anger, and Danny forced his way up, leaning heavily against the wall on one of the exposed beams. He was tired, so tired. Too tired for just this, and he shook his head, pale dust from the wall flying from his snowy hair as green eyes turned wearily to find Tucker and Charlie matched in a battle of wills, a bloody red shield in front of Tucker as he hissed things in Latin, and Charlie sending dozens of dagger-like lights at it.

Every time they hit Tucker's jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed, his voice rising into a fierce growl as his hands pushed against the shield, steadying it. The light daggers paused for a moment and Tucker clapped his hands against the shield making it shatter, pieces flying at Charlie and slicing at her face and outstretched clawed hands.

More black ichor dripped and Danny breathed in suddenly, the stitch in his side mercifully dulling so that he could actually catch a full breath with having it hitch at the pain in his side. He took to the air again, now rushing Tucker and pulling them both out of the way as a massive attack impacted where Tucker had just stood, where Danny had just flown. Green eyes met green, and Tucker smiled sinisterly.

"Let's get her," he muttered and climbed to his feet amidst Danny's confusion. Tucker turned green eyes back on Danny and raised an eyebrow. "You heard Sam. Charlie's not lilin." He turned to the succubus and flicked his fingers at her sending red shockwaves of magic to impact on a newly formed shield. "You're not, are you?"

Charlie growled and Danny crouched down to launch himself at her. Then Tucker knifed a hand in front of him, red light welling along his arm and flying from his fingertips to slice into the shield in front of Charlie. It hit her and made her stagger back, clawed toes digging in to the wooden floor of Danny's bedroom and trying to halt her backward progress, gouging holes and furrows as she went anyway.

"We can hurt her," Danny said, understanding dawning.

"Half right," was Tucker's menacing reply. "She's not immortal. We can kill her."

The smile that crossed Danny's face was dark and more than a little evil. It was matched by the leering sort of grin on Tucker's face as he lit his fists up with his magic, glowing brilliantly red, Danny's blazing green ectoenergy not far behind as both men began attacking without hesitation. Blood flowed, human red, ghostly green, inhuman black. It was fierce and violent, and for the life of him, Danny couldn't understand how magic would keep the sounds of the battle from piercing through walls that were thinner than he ever wanted to admit.

His room was being torn apart, and Danny was relieved that he had taken Tucker's advice to remove the things that couldn't be replaced before they had settled in to wait for Charlie to show. At the very least, anything left that was destroyed wasn't going to hurt him. Well, much, Danny realized as he was tossed back again, this time plowing down into his bed. The four wooden legs broke and he grimaced knowing that he'd have to find a new one after this.

"Give up, child," Charlie called tauntingly at him as Tucker flew past to hit the wall and slide down it, eyes closed, glasses knocked askance. "Even now you're no match for me."

"I'd rather die than give up," was all Danny said as he darted back at her, shifting in the air as new blades of light flipped past him, where he had been, and he dragged the succubus down to the ground, pinning her beneath him, a knee in her chest between her breast, pressing down until he was afraid he would hear something crack, knowing that if he did hear it he might be sick.

"Where is she?" he hissed, hands clenching the creature's wrists above her head, his face inches from hers as his eyes burned into hers.

And she laughed. "If I had known that a little kink was all it would take to bring you to my bed, we could have done this so much more easily."

Danny's face went brightly red and he was suddenly flipped up as the succubus pushed up unexpectedly with her pelvis, flipping him over her head. She laughed against at the confusion and surprise on his face when he found himself abruptly underneath her, _his_ hands now pinned above _his_ head as she leaned down close, her tongue snaking out to run along his lips as he struggled against her inhuman strength.

"Your power tastes so good," she whispered thickly, and Danny felt the sudden need to wretch as something stabbed inside his mind, sending rivulets of red bleeding across his eyes as they slipped closed.

And when he opened his eyes against he smiled through the sick feeling, smiled up at Sam who was sitting across his lap, smiling down at him with a knowing look to her eye. "You wouldn't hurt me, would you Danny?" she asked, and Danny shook his head as he sat up, sliding his arms around her, her dark hair moving silkily over the backs of his hands.

"I wouldn't ever hurt you, Sam," he whispered softly as his lips founds hers and he kissed her hungrily, delighting in the whimpered moans she gave, the way her throat vibrated beneath his lips as he moved his mouth down the pale line of it, tongue flicking out to caress the beat of her pulse beneath her skin. "I love you."

_"Ego vomica vos ut gelu."_

Sam convulsed in his arms and Danny drew back, worried. "Sam? What's wrong?"

She smiled at him thinly. "Nothing is wrong, Danny. Kiss me again."

He did, this time drawing her even more into his arms, feeling her wiggle against him as he groaned with the pleasant friction. "I want you, Sam," he whispered into her mouth as his hands stroked through her long, dark hair. "I've always wanted you."

_"Ut glacialis vita vacuus diligo tepidus ullus pius." _

"So take me," she ordered tightly, her fingers gripping forcefully at his shoulders. He shifted, wincing as he shifted against her.

"Sam," he started and drew back as her eyes flashed brightly at him. "I didn't mean it like that." He smoothed a hand along her cheek, pressing a chaste kiss to her lips. "Sam, I love you, I want you to marry me. Will you?"

_"Haud tactus, haud vir neque nec mulier, haud pietas, valde neque nec vegrandis." _

She threw her head back and screamed, and the illusion dissolved around Danny as he blinked painfully, pushing Charlie from his lap and then grabbing on to the long pale hair that slid through his fingers. He tugged, jerking her head back against the force of the push, and her teeth rattled in her skull as she found herself flat on the floor, black blood dripped from her face and mouth where she had hit.

"You know," Danny said from where he was crouched as Charlie drew herself up to her feet. "I don't normally hit girls. But for you, I'll make an exception." He launched himself at her and she was driven back as his fist smashed into her throat, then drew back ever so slightly as he hovered in front of her where she was pinned against the wall.

From behind him she heard the mage's voice again, and screamed. _"Ego vomica vos ut vita vos exertus sumo."_

"Where is she?" Danny's voice whispered through the pain making Charlie turn blurry yellow eyes on him and hiss.

"She'll be dead before you can find her, human." A cough and wince as Danny's fingers arrowed into the tender skin of her throat, pressing painfully deep and cutting off her breath, her blood, the lack making her sick and dizzy. Charlie only closed her eyes as she felt the death curse that still hung over her head; a baleful cloud of anger and desperation that still bided its time.

Danny pressed again and Charlie hitch in a gasping breath, realizing that all of her spells were unraveling, falling apart, and the power she had leeched from him during the drawn out fight was beginning to slip back along the damaged links to its true owner. _Like a faithful dog to its master,_ she thought bitterly as fire ignited in her throat.

She opened her eyes and found Danny still there, narrowed eyes glowing brightly green. And Tucker, too, next to him with his hand raised to her, his eyes a darker shade but glowing nonetheless, his hand held to her glowing with crimson energy that he held in a vise-like grip. _So this is fear,_ she thought, and pushed out with the power she had left, driving them back and dropping to the floor without Danny's hand holding her against the wall.

They hadn't been prepared for it, a desperate last push that was intended to save her life, not to try and take theirs. Not that Charlie wouldn't have taken them down if she could, but she wasn't even trying. Just trying to save herself. And it gave her an edge that they hadn't realized she held. Danny went first, his head cracking in to the solid oak footboard of his bed. Tucker not nearly so far—he hadn't been touching the succubus, only threatening her.

With a glance at Danny's prone form Charlie turned a delighted smile on Tucker, making his hands flood with magic as he used it to push her back into the wall. "It's just you and me little mage," she called in a sing song.

Tucker didn't say anything, trusting that Danny's superior recuperating would bring him back to the fight before Tucker couldn't hold her anymore.

_"Dic mihi te me amare,"_ she whispered, and Tucker blinked at the force of the glamour as it washed over him.

"Get a life," he muttered back and turned his eyes away from hers for a second to the faint groan from behind him. His eyes bled magic as he turned them back to Charlie. _"Eversor recursat."_

Charlie shot him a baleful smile as Danny climbed to his feet behind Tucker, a flash of light telling Tucker that Danny had let go of his ghost side to embrace humanity. Footsteps and then Danny was standing next to Tucker in his jeans and black shirt, boots tapping against the wooden floor in anger and annoyance. Tucker chuckled at the way Danny stared at the blood on his fingers from where he had just touched his head.

"You just never get it easy, do you?" he asked and Danny shook his head.

"She broke my bed. Twice." It was amused and pitiful.

"Oh, she should be destroyed."

Another flash of light, but this time green as ghost energy seeped from Danny's eyes and hands, trickling up his arms like dancing flames. "Yes," he said softly, dangerously. "She should be."

He took two steps forward and knelt next to Charlie, his face close enough to hers that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin. "Where is Sam?"

"To hell with you," Charlie spat. "You'll kill me either way,"

Danny nodded without pity. "You're right; I would." He leaned close to her ear, his breath tickling the creamy shell of it as he whispered, "Give my regards to Lilith."

There was another blinding flash of green energy and Tucker blinked his eyes furiously as Danny stood, the body next to him collapsing without Tucker magically pressing it against the wall. There was a sear along the side of Charlie's head, and Tucker swallowed convulsively as he wondered exactly what had happened. It was obvious that she was dead, but he'd never realized that his friend could kill that quickly.

Or even at all.

"Don't, Tucker," Danny said quietly as Tucker backed away from the body to drop to his knees and retch. "We don't have time for you to lose your lunch. _Sam_ doesn't have time."

Tucker hugged his head against his knees, willing his stomach to calm. He'd been around ghosts for years, known that they were dead. But it wasn't the same as being so close to a body, and knowing that you were, to an extent, responsible for the death of the person that it used to be. It wasn't the same, but Tucker bit back the nausea, clenched it tightly behind his teeth and jaw, willing himself to calm down before he did throw up.

There was a flash of silver and Tucker turned sick eyes up to see Danny Phantom hoisting Charlie's body up, draping it across his shoulder and lifting off the ground gently to hover for a moment, and then disappear through the roof with it. It was too much, and Tucker lurched to his feet and stumbled for the bathroom down the hall, trying to be as quiet as he could be as he vomited until he thought his insides were going to come up if he heaved a single time more.

By the time that Tucker had cleaned himself off, calmed the remaining nausea with cold water, and made it back to Danny's room, Danny had already returned. Empty handed, and Tucker raised an eyebrow as he gave Danny a weak smile. Danny only shook his head. "Don't ask, you don't want to know."

Truth was, Danny didn't want to have to tell his already distressed friend that he had incinerated the body miles above the city and let the wind take the ashes where it would.

Without a word Danny stripped his shirt off and pressed it gently to the bleeding slash along his right side, wincing as it made the wound on his left shoulder break open and seep fresh red blood down his arm. Within moments there were careful hands tugging the shirt away and blotting at both wounds alternatively. "The kit was under the bed, wasn't it?" Tucker asked, much more calm as the familiarity of patching Danny up took over and replaced the revulsion he had been victim to.

Danny nodded. "Yeah. It was."

"Don't you have a backup kit?"

"I'm not braving Jazz's room to get it," was all Danny muttered, and Tucker chuckled quietly, letting Danny's hand take the job of stopping the bleeding as he tugged open the warped door of Danny's closet and dug through it into the back. He emerged with a raggedy looking bag and brought it over to Danny, dumping the contents on the floor.

A veritable treasure trove if first aid supplies, and he worked in silence until the question couldn't be ignored anymore. "Danny?" Tucker asked quietly as he laid tape along the edges of the bandage at Danny's shoulder. There was no response except for the sudden tensing of muscle along Danny's entire body. "Doesn't it bother you?"

Silence reigned for a long moment and then Danny finally answered quietly. "It wasn't my first time." Silence again as Tucker understood and then Danny whispering, "Please don't tell Sam."

xXx

It was cold. More than cold, and Sam sat up with a wince for the aches and pains that the cold had brought to the surface as she had lain on the frozen ground. Her skin had patches of ice on it but as far as she could tell, there were no places that were more than a little frozen. No frost bite, nothing that didn't move or feel. And she was alive.

Alive and free, she realized as she crawled to the edge of the rock as it floated in the Ghost Zone, and reached her hand past the edge with no trouble.

More than that; the magic that she called on without thinking to warm herself responded like it hadn't since before she had been taken, casting the death curse on the monster that had taken her and lost the majority of her power to it. A smile split Sam's face as she realized that it was more than the majority. More than half of all of the power she had collected to use while trapped in the Ghost Zone had bled over into the death curse. She had more power at her disposal than she knew what to do with.

No; she knew what to do with it. The first thing was to get warm, and get warm she did, surrounding herself with a simple spell that melted the icy patches from her body and dispelled the goose bumps in no time to leave her comfortable and warm. And still so much power left. Sam closed her eyes and smiled, an idea waking in the back of her mind.

True, she knew that Danny and Tucker would come looking for her. They might even go to Clockwork to try and find her, though there was no guarantee of help from the corner. As helpful as he'd been in the past, Clockwork was devoted to his timelines, and wouldn't lift a finger unless it was what he was supposed to do. _Like Spiderman,_ she thought amused. "Great power and great responsibility," this time aloud and making her chuckle as the idea in her mind finally took shape.

"I want to go home," she said into the swirling green void, and wrapped her arms around herself preparing as she always did for a projection. But this time, instead of aiming for a general place, an idea of where she wanted to send her mind to, Sam let her mind focus on an object.

She didn't know what, but it was in the human world and resonated to her. A whisper later and she was there, not even half of the stored magic gone as she knelt on the hardwood floor of Danny's bedroom, eyes suddenly blurring with tears as she reached out and touched the broken bed that was next to her, fingers running across it as she did.

"I'm back," she whispered, and her voice broke as her eyes shot around the room looking for whatever it had been that had brought her home, to Danny's room of all placed. _Home._ The amber globe Danny had given her was glinting at her from the floor next to his desk and she summoned it to her hand without a thought, looking at it and smiling, really smiling. "I'm home," she said again, and this time said it loud enough that it broke across the disaster that was Danny's room.

There was blood everywhere, dotted and splashed. Red, green and black. Sam wrinkled her nose at it and waved a hand across it all, watching in satisfaction as it disappeared, bleeding itself into nothingness as she watched. Then Sam looked about the room consideringly, an eyebrow arched as she felt along the lines of power that she had gained with what had obviously been Charlie's death. She had enough power. There was no reason she couldn't…

She closed her eyes again and let the magic flow out of her, all the while whispering one thing in her mind: _make everything as it was_. It occurred to Sam as she opened her eyes that it was just as well that she had already removed the blood, or else she might have found herself with another Charlie to contend with, as well as clones of Danny and Tucker. The magic had been powerful and had done exactly as she asked.

The room was cleaner than she had ever seen it before, which might not have been saying a lot considering that Danny was male. But the shiny newness to the floor would never blend with the rest of the house ever again. There were no gouges, no tears. It was perfect, pristine, whole. The walls were back into their former state; smooth and unmarred, no cracks or missing pieces of plaster. In fact, Sam couldn't find a single seam along them anywhere, and she _knew_ that Danny had done raggedy patch jobs along the way when he'd unexpectedly come across new powers and accidentally destroyed more than a little of his room.

His computer was missing, along with several other things, but the broken furniture was new again. The bed had been mended at the footboard where it had been cracked in half, and the legs had become whole again to lift it from the floor. She peered underneath and realized that her desire had extended even to the things that would have been crushed, should have been crushed. And now weren't.

Even the clothes in Danny's dirty hamper were clean. Sam chuckled and felt along the lines of power that remained to her. Only a bit more than half had been used. She'd save the rest for later. She smiled. All Sam wanted now was a hot shower and a warm bed. Her eyes shined as she reached into Danny's closet and tugged out some clean clothes.

xXx

Skulker had been a bust, only desiring to exchange barbed comments and a few ectoblasts. Technus hadn't been much better, preferring to try and take over the Specter Speeder that Tucker was driving along behind Danny as he hurtled through the green ether of the Ghost Zone. Danny sighed with a wince for his aching head, consciously telling himself not to reach up to touch the wound.

Tucker was right; it probably should have been stitched.

Currently Danny was flying towards the place in the Ghost Zone that was dominated by a castle filled with gears and ticking clocks. If anyone could help him, it would be Clockwork. The only question was if the ancient time master would be willing. Danny had never pretended that Clockwork involved himself in the timeline for his sole protection. It had happened a handful of times, when he had been younger and foolish enough to think that things could be better by changing his past.

In fact, the incident with his older, evil, fully ghost self had been the only time Clockwork had intervened without Danny asking—demanding, he corrected with a rueful chuckle. And that was something that still would never happen, no matter what. He'd die first, whether at someone else's hands or his own. He would _never_ allow himself to turn into a monster like that.

"I can see it." Tucker's voice crackled over the Fenton Phones, and Danny peered into the gloomy distance.

"What, do you have binoculars or something?" Danny asked as he found nothing but a smudge on the horizon. He could almost see Tucker shrugging behind him as a chuckle came across the Phones, and Danny picked up the pace, willing the castle to come closer that much more quickly.

The Specter Speeder roared along behind him and Danny tried to ignore the growing weariness that seeped through his body as the castle finally came into view, and he slowed a little, hoping that easing back would help his body recoup some of the energy he'd lost in the fight. And with the blood. It was something he couldn't ignore, he'd lost blood enough times to now that losing too much would tire him out until his body replaced it.

"Do you think he'll help us?" This time Tucker's voice came from next to him as he emerged from the landed Speeder, his boots touching down lightly as he followed Danny inside.

Danny could only shrug. "I don't know, Tuck. But we have to ask."

Tucker nodded but couldn't stop the shiver that slid down his back as he looked around Clockwork's abode. "Hey, Danny?" he called as his friend moved further into the lair, and then disappeared abruptly. Tucker moved closer to what he'd seen that had made him break the silence, and then he yelled, startled and jumping back with his mage power rippling along his hands.

"Don't shoot, it's just me." Danny sighed heavily. "He's not here, either by accident or design." Danny shrugged again. "We're on our own now."

Tucker nodded and then pointed behind him. "Is that what I think it is?"

Danny raised an eyebrow and peered into the shadow, then smirked as he picked up a battered Fenton Thermos and shook it. Hard. The resulting grunts from inside were followed by things that would have made a much younger Danny and Tucker blush at the very thought of the words, much less hearing them. now they could only whistle appreciatively.

"So," Danny asked. "How do you like the thermos?"

There was a faint growl and Danny laughed, rattling the thermos again. Another shake and he placed it back on its pedestal with a chuckle and a sigh. "As much fun as that was, we have more pressing things to do."

Tucker nodded. "Let's go find Sam."

xXx

**Latin Key: **

**_Ego vomica vos ut gelu_****: I curse you to the cold. **

**_Ut glacialis vita vacuus diligo tepidus ullus pius_****: To a frozen life devoid of love, lust, warmth of any kind. **

**_Haud tactus, haud vir neque nec mulier, haud pietas, valde neque nec vegrandis_****: No touch, neither man nor woman, no kindness, great nor small. **

**_Ego vomica vos ut vita vos exertus sumo_****: I curse you to the life you tried to take. **

**_Dic mihi te me amare_****: Tell me you love me. **

**_Eversor recursat_****: The destroyer returns. **


	16. Chapter 16

Beneath the Surface 

16

_Death was a humiliation she had never expected to suffer. Even now, bound by magic into the human form she'd been using before her death, Charlie could not believe that she had been beaten, destroyed. By a half trained mage, a witch girl, and a creature that should not have existed, much less twice over. She'd had everything planned so perfectly; it had been above the pettiness of failure. _

_"You're the one that mucked about in the human world, aren't you?" _

_The question seemed to pierce through the noises around her, and Charlie turned fuming yellow eyes towards the speaker. It was a woman, almost a succubus, but the way she felt inside Charlie's mind was different from any of the lilin and half-blood's she had every encountered in her centuries of life. She was tall, much taller than Charlie, and taller than any man she had ever met with, perhaps, the exception of Jack Fenton. A curse rolled through Charlie's mind at the remembrance, but it was gone again as she wondered who the woman was. _

_Pale skin that shone like moonlight, and slender fingers with nails filed to wickedly sharp points. They looked human, though Charlie knew the woman wasn't. she had hair that fell in flaming cascades past her shoulders, her waist, and curled in fiery red at her thighs, moving and rippling in a breeze of its own making. But her eyes… _

_Her eyes were empty, as black as a starless night and just as deep. Charlie turned her still inhuman eyes from the soulless gaze and shivered, her short human hair dancing at her shoulders. _

_"You chose poorly, Granddaughter." _

_Charlie's eyes flashed up to the red-ripe smile on the woman's face. Lilith's face, she realized as the demon knelt before her and trailed a sharp clawed nail down her cheek. _

_"Your ambition had led you to death." Her voice whispered and curled through Charlie's mind. "I thank you for sacrificing yourself that I might keep my covenant." _

_Charlie swallowed thickly. "I didn't sacrifice myself," she managed to force out at the sudden heat erupting around her. _

_Lilith smiled and Charlie shivered even though the heat. "Didn't you?" Charlie shook her head, and Lilith laughed, a sound that made things inside of her writhe in wanton ecstasy. For a moment Charlie wondered if that was what it was like to be lilin, to have the power to make a human, even a succubus such as herself, give in to the basest of desires so quickly and without thought. Lilith laughed again and the pleasure disappeared as quickly as it came. _

_"Did you really think to step between love as you tried, my child?" The anger that flashed in Charlie's eyes was the only answer she could give, and Lilith pressed a searing kiss to her forehead. "What God, my granddaughter, had joined together, no other can place asunder." _

_Charlie closed her eyes. _

_"Your punishment for trying is to appease the souls you stole in life." _

_"No," came Charlie's quick gasp, and the fear that tore through her made her want to retch against the cracked and dead ground beneath her knees. _

_"Yes," said Lilith, her arm a graceful line through the steamy air. "Look now, they come." _

_Charlie turned her eyes to the horizon and saw a dark blur against it. Hell, she realized, was not a generalization. No, it was more personal than anything she had ever done in life. And she would pay the price of it. _

xXx

"I, uh, don't think that would be a good idea," Danny said uncertainly as Desiree floated in front of him, her arms crossed over her chest and one of her eyebrows arched in annoyance.

"Well why not? I am a wishing ghost, you could make a wish and have your answer," she shot back at him.

Danny shot a glance at Tucker, who only shrugged. _Thanks, Tuck,_ he thought fiercely at his friend before turning back to the ghost. "Thanks, Desiree, but it's still a no." This time Danny didn't wait for a response to his rejection. Instead, he hurtled past Desiree as fast as he could which, while he was still exhausted, was considerably faster than she could move.

Tucker followed and Danny sighed, scrubbing a hand across his jaw and fighting back the yawn that wanted to escape. "How long have we been searching?" he asked Tucker, who hadn't managed to suppress his own yawn.

"Couple of hours. It's nearly three."

Danny sighed, knowing that soon they would have to stop or risk themselves. It was one thing to fly around the Ghost Zone while at full power and wide awake. Another to think such impunity could be gotten away with when he made a wonderful target, as tired as he was. All he needed was to run into Walker in the state he was in. he'd finally be serving his sentence. Danny smirked a little. He'd only be doing time until he'd managed to get some rest. Then he'd orchestrate another prison break and be out and home.

A frown followed as his mind processed that in the intervening time it took him to get some rest, break out of jail and escape, Sam could die. That was unacceptable; he would never let that happen.

"Danny, watch out!"

The cry that came over the Fenton Phones startled Danny into a dead stop, saving him from the flying fist of energy where he would have been if he'd been flying still. "What the hell?" Danny muttered as he glanced around, only to groan in frustration.

"Long time no see, Dipstick." Ember chuckled at him, her guitar slung across her shoulders as she floated in front of him. "What brings you to my corner of the Ghost Zone?"

Danny raised an eyebrow and glanced back at Tucker. This time Tucker offered advice instead of shrugging. "She's being civil." He ignored the roll of Danny's eyes, knowing that the ghost was thinking of the attack that had barely missed him. "Sort of civil. Ask nicely; maybe she's seen Sam."

This time Danny shrugged, but he did as Tucker suggested. "We're looking for Sam. Seen her?"

Ember cracked her gum and wrinkled her nose. "You lost your little girlfriend?"

"She's not my girlfriend," Danny growled, and groaned at the disbelief that came from both sides. "Alright, fine. She's not my girlfriend _yet_. Christ, what is it with everyone nosing in my love life?"

"You're just so entertaining," came Tucker's voice over the Phones, crackling a little as Ember chuckled.

She pointed at Tucker and said, "I'm with him. You humans are better than soap operas."

"You watch soap operas?" was Tucker's surprised question as Danny said, "Aren't soap operas done with humans?"

Ember rolled her eyes. "It's like reality television without a shred of intelligence."

"Hey!" Tucker shouted. "I resent that!"

"Baby pop, you _resemble_ that."

"Alright, enough!" Danny shouted as Tucker geared up to shoot another barb at the ghost who was now floating next to the Specter Speeder. "Dude, what happened to civil?" he asked, turning on Tucker.

Ember smirked and Danny leveled angry green eyes at her. "And you're egging him on."

She shrugged. "It's what I do."

Danny sighed as Tucker fired the thrusters on the Specter Speeder and adjust his drift back towards Danny. "So have you seen her or not? Simple question. Answer it and we're out of your way."

With another pop of her gum Ember shook her head. "You guys are the only people I've seen this side of Skulker's door for a few days. Except the dog."

"The dog?" The quizzical expression on Danny's face made her laugh.

"The dog. The cute little green ghost dog that's floating behind you."

Danny spun around midair and groaned as he saw a familiar drooling face. Then yelped as said drooling face buried its nose at his groin. "Cujo! Stop! Sit! Down, boy!" he yelled as Tucker laughed at him over the Fenton Phones and Ember waved a lazy finger at him, muttering, "Later, Dipstick."

"Tucker, a little help, please!"

But there was no help coming from that corner and Danny wondered whether it was a good or bad thing that Tucker was practically crying from laughing. Probably a bad thing, Danny thought as he scooped Cujo out of the air as he leaped to lick Danny's face. He set a ball of ectoenergy glowing in the palm of his hand and then waved it in front of the little ghost dog's face.

"See that, boy? You want that ball?" Cujo slobbered madly and Danny was hard put to hold on to the dog as he wagged his back half fit to fall off. "Yeah, you want that ball," Danny cooed and Cujo whined. Without a moments hesitation Danny cocked his arm and launched the ball as far as he could—which was a considerable distance—in the direction that Ember had flown off in.

A blue of ectoenergy Cujo took off, and Danny motioned for Tucker to follow him as he took off in the opposite direction. The way back to the Fenton Portal, he admitted with a rueful sigh. They moved at speed, but Danny couldn't help but grin when he heard the disgusted cry that Ember gave as Cujo, no doubt, did something to her that involved dog drool. Lots and lots of dog drool. He snickered. Maybe she'd play fetch with the little ghost. He was lonely, and the ball of energy that Danny had sent him off after wouldn't burn out for days.

"Uh, Danny? we're going the wrong way."

Danny glanced back at the Speeder and shook his head. "No. We're not. We have to go back. Regroup, get some rest." He held a hand up and tried to make another ball of energy like he'd done for Cujo. This time it was only half the size and not nearly as bright. "This is about all I'm good for," he admitted as Tucker nodded.

"Come on, grab a ride, Danny," Tucker said quietly over the Fenton Phones. "Won't do us much good if you turn back to human and I have to chase you down."

With a sigh Danny phased through the side of the Speeder and settled into the seat next to Tucker and closed his eyes as he let go of his ghost powers, feeling the familiar tingling of himself reverting to human. He groaned and sat a little straighter in the seat. "I'm done in," he said, and Tucker nodded as he pushed down on the throttle and sent the Speeder shooting back toward the Portal.

"We'll get back a lot more quickly than coming out," he said into the silence. "I thought maybe I could cast a locating spell when we come back. There's enough ambient magic in the air that a spell should work really well."

Danny didn't say anything and Tucker glanced over at him worriedly. He thought that maybe the half ghost had passed out; he'd certainly used enough energy since the night had started for him to do so. He'd used, Tucker admitted quietly to himself, a lot more energy than Tucker had. Danny could only draw on whatever power, strength was inside of himself. Tucker had been leaching magic from anywhere he could before tapping into his own resources to control it. He was in a lot better shape. Tired, yes, but not anywhere near the level of exhaustion that his friend was.

"I fucked up, didn't I?"

Danny's voice was dull and edged and startled Tucker. "What do you mean?"

Danny shifted on the seat and let blue eyes roam over the various doors as they passed. "I shouldn't have killed her so quickly. She was right—Sam's going to be dead before we can find her."

"Don't talk like that, Danny." Tucker's voice was firm, and he shifted his eyes over to look at Danny, who was slumped in the seat dejectedly. "You did what had to be done. No one is going to blame you for that, least of all, Sam."

Danny grunted and closed his eyes. "She won't thank me if she winds up dead because I killed the only person who could tell us where she is."

Tucker snorted at that. "Dude. Charlie wasn't going to tell you short of torture, if she'd even tell you then. And you wouldn't torture her." He paused for a moment, his stomach rebelling at the thought of Danny doing something like that. He'd said he wouldn't, but Tucker hadn't realized that he could kill. Would kill. So maybe he was wrong on this, too, and the thought was more than he could bear. "Would you have tortured her if you thought it would get you the answers?"

The silence was thick between them and Tucker did jump when Danny finally answered him. "Don't ask questions that you don't want the answer to, Tucker." An answer, yes, and a poor one.

Just as quietly, Tucker said, "You didn't answer my question." Danny said nothing, and Tucker tried again. "Danny, that wasn't an answer."

"It's one kind of answer, Tuck. Let it be."

He did, realizing that it was an answer, if he knew what to look for. Even if he didn't like the answer, he knew it. Tucker drove along in silence as Danny slipped into sleep next to him, and Tucker didn't begrudge him the rest. Instead, he used the silence to wonder that had happened to his best friend in the two years since he'd left for college that would make him into the person Tucker had seen tonight. A man who was capable of killing without remorse. Who admitted, albeit in a roundabout way, that he could and would torture someone if he had to.

Tucker blinked suddenly as he thought back. The kind of person that would go toe to toe with a grieving mother over flowers and not seem to care who he hurt to do what needed to be done. The kind of person that could take serious wounds with barely any protest, who had to be in a hell of a lot of pain even now, but had stayed silent and steady until he'd fallen asleep.

The kind of person who could say, "I took care of it," when asked about a scar that was several feet long and obviously verging on fatal. And never mind that Tucker now wondered what, exactly, taking care of it meant. He didn't think he'd like the answer to that.

In fact, Tucker was sure that he didn't like the picture he'd come up with, and all he could think was, _What happened to you in _ _California?_ A question that he knew he wasn't going to ask. Better to play along with the illusion of normalcy Danny fought so hard for, and go back to pretending he was just as clueless about whatever was going in Danny's head. Tucker was beginning to think that knowing what went on in Danny's head might scare the life out of him.

Tucker was turned away from his disturbing thoughts by the flash of the Fenton Portal where it opened into the Ghost Zone ahead of him. Easy enough to guide the Specter Speeder to it and thumb the button that opened the doors from this side. He was yawning as he maneuvered through it, and then set the Speeder down inside the lab with a soft whoosh as the engines powered down. _Not a scratch on it or a millimeter off mark,_ Tucker thought to himself, pleased.

He glanced at his watch and realized that it was well past four, and then shuffled around to Danny to shake him awake and drag him up the stairs. Times like these he wished he was the taller of the two, but he'd make do. Danny stirred blearily for a moment, not even registering that they were downstairs in his parents' lab until Tucker was tugging him out of the Speeder, looping an arm over his shoulders and saying, "Come on, Danny. You have to help or I'm leaving your ass down here."

Danny groaned a little and then hissed sharply as his wounded side jarred into Tucker. Tucker made a move to go around to the other side and Danny shook his head sharply, suddenly wide awake, the pain having cleared any lingering grogginess from his mind. "Got it on both sides, remember?" he reminded Tucker, and then, "Of the two, I'd rather not crack the one on my shoulder open again."

"Gotcha," Tucker said and let Danny lean on him as they climbed the stairs to the ground level of the Fenton home.

Danny groaned again as they mounted the stairs to the second floor and Tucker shushed him quietly. "The spell of silence is gone, and it was only around your room. Don't wake anyone up; I don't want to have to try and explain you to them."

Danny chuckled silently. "No, it's just my room is trashed."

Tucker shrugged as he leaned Danny against the door, letting Danny stagger under his own weight. "We'll make do. I don't have the energy to spare on cleaning, and I _know_ that you don't."

A lazy chuckle was all Tucker got in reply as he let the door swing inward, holding a hand out to catch Danny if he stumbled as he staggered through the doorway. And then stopped dead in his tracks. For a moment Tucker thought that Danny was going to fall over, or maybe just keel over, but no, he was as steady on his feet as he'd been earlier at full power. And then Tucker noticed that the room… was not as they had left it. It should have been a disaster, blood and broken wood and fallen plaster everywhere.

And now it wasn't.

Instead it looked like Danny had actually cleaned it. Along with repaired everything ever damaged with perfect craftsman precision. Everything was in one piece again, even the bed. Hell, the bed was even made. Except for the lump stretched down the middle. A blanket? A pillow? And then he caught a glimpse of long black hair draped across the paler blue of the pillowcase, and his heart nearly stopped. The only sound in the room seemed to be Danny's ragged breathing as he stood still and stared, but Tucker could see the lines of tension across his shoulders.

"Sam."

A strangled whisper as Danny swayed where he stood, and the slim figure under the blankets on Danny's bed shot upright, blinking sleepily and then scrambling out of the bed, a pair of Danny's pajamas loose about her slender frame, to dart across the smooth and shiny floor to both men, one arm looping around Danny's neck, the other around Tucker's, and he was vaguely aware that he was crying as Sam clung to both of them.

She was crying too, and Danny was close to it if he wasn't already—Tucker couldn't tell with the way his friend had buried his face into Sam's neck, her dark hair hiding him from view. The only other thing that Tucker noticed was how the girl seemed to pulse with magic, little bolts of it straggling out as she let him go and turned to Danny, wrapping her arms around his neck and holding tightly.

She could feel his breath hot against her neck, and thought that he was even crying, but when she finally got Danny to look at her she saw that he was dry eyed. Not even the energy to cry, and Sam ran a hand along his cheek as he cupped her hand there with his own. His eyes were dark and almost dull as he stared down at her, completely unreadable as she smiled up at him.

"Long time no see," she whispered shakily and Danny nodded.

Then he leaned forward and kissed her, warm and worried and gently needy. It nearly started the tears again as she realized that even as exhausted as he was he still wanted to touch her first. With a strangled laugh whispered against his lips she let some of the magic she still held bleed out and flow through him, directing it to find the places he needed help most and to fix it so that it wasn't needed anymore. His shoulder, his side, a glancing wound along the back of his head that went down to his skull.

A faint ache around his heart that lessened with every beat, and a soul deep weariness that she could barely touch, but could at least send tiny streaks of power into it to try and help, if not heal. And then it bled past Danny, something she hadn't intended but wouldn't stop once it happened as she realized how terribly tired Tucker was too. Not wounded, thank god, but she could, would and did bolster his magical reserves with some of the power she had regained on Charlie's death.

When she was done, when she let go of Danny and pulled to stare at her best friends in the whole world, she was relieved to find neither of them wanting or needing to collapse where they stood because of exhaustion. Startled smiles came all around as first Tucker, then Danny, realized that she'd done something, but still not quite figuring out exactly what it was. It was Danny who realized it; she figured it was because the places in his body that had been loudly screaming at him moments before were now silent and still. Healed and whole.

A startled smile from him as he raised the side of his shirt to look at what should have been a long bandaged gash, blood seeping through and staining it red. Without hesitating Danny pulled the spotted bandage off to see smooth skin. A hint of scar, Sam wasn't versed well enough in healing magic to make it perfect—she was much more combative than she'd ever admit to being—but healed. A hand flew to the bulky bandage at his shoulder, then he was tugging his shirt off to rip at the bandage and stare at almost perfect skin; fingers flying to the back of his head to feel what had been a most painful cut. Nothing.

"I'd ask how but I'm not even sure I want to know," Tucker muttered as he pulled Danny's head down to examine it, then let him go with a snort. "I'm impressed, but where'd you get all of that power?"

"I know you were in the Ghost Zone. Didn't you feel all of the ambient magic?" Sam asked as she stepped forward to Danny, grabbing his hands and letting hers slide up his arms to wind at his neck, burying her face against his chest as he held on to her. "I was trying to use it to come back, but every time I siphoned it off it got funneled into the curse," she said, her voice muffled.

Tucker's face split into a wide grin. "I knew it!" he crowed. And then clapped a hand over his mouth before he managed to wake up the entire Fenton household, something he didn't really want to do.

"Sam," Danny said quietly, a hint of urgency to his voice as he pulled back and stared down at her. "She wasn't lilin?"

Sam shook her head. "Her mother was. Her father wasn't. She was a bastardized sub-race of succubi."

Danny chuckled. "I dare you to say that five times quickly." She swung an arm out to swat at his now uninjured shoulder and Danny caught it on reflex, pulling her close and kissed her again, pure desperation for wanting her on his lips as he did.

And Sam, trapped alone for as long as she had been, touched only a handful of times during her captivity and even then mostly in pain, could only give in to it, winding her arms around his neck, pressing her thinly clad against his, whimpering as his strong hands splayed at the small of her back, hot and fierce through the thin cotton of his own pajamas. An all out moan as the shirt rode up under his hands and skin touched skin. A desperate plea as Danny pulled back to whisper, "Sam? Don't leave me again, okay, Sam?"

Tears rimmed her eyes as she shook her head. "I'm not leaving you again, not ever again," and pressed her lips to his again, wanting, needing, to feel the way his mouth moved on hers.

And then they were springing apart at the pointed throat clearing next to them, and looked over to stare at a bemused Tucker who had tugged off his beret and held it to his face. "As happy as I am that you two are all together, can you stop so my brain doesn't bleed?" Danny gave a strangled laugh and pulled Sam tighter against him, this time only pressing a kiss to the crook of her neck.

"Seriously," Tucker said. "Get a room."

Danny laughed again, this time sounding like pure evil. "We have a room. My room. Go find your own room." Sam flushed red as Tucker choked between a laugh and a snort.

"I'm not using the guest room until we've gone over it by daylight with a fine tooth comb. That thing is so wreathed in spells I'd be terrified to go near it the way I'm feeling." Tucker was serious again as he tugged the beret back into place. "So I'll make you a deal: I'm crawling into your bed, and I'm going to sleep for a few decades."

"Where's the deal?" Sam asked curiously as Danny wondered if he really wanted to know.

Tucker grinned widely, teeth flashing white. "The deal is that you don't do anything you don't want me to record on my PDA." He ignored the furious blushes from both his friends as he shouldered his trench coat off and draped it at Danny's desk, on the chair, and dropped his beret and PDA on the desk.

"I hate to even agree with Tucker right now, but sleep does sound pretty good right now," Danny admitted, one hand rubbing at the back of his neck. "The patch up job was great, Sam, but still…"

She shrugged, amused and still a little embarrassed at Tucker's insinuation. "Don't worry about it, Danny," she said as she ran a hand along his jaw, pressing a chaste kiss to the corner of his mouth. "I saw the room, I know it was rough." She smirked. "Who do you think fixed it?"

There were no more arguments as she crawled into the bed, curling up at the top beneath the sheet as Tucker stretched out across the foot of the bed, toeing his boots off and dragging the blanket from beneath himself to wrap up in it with a tired sigh. Tucker was already half asleep before Danny made any move to the bed and Sam, thinking that it was completely insane that he'd just gotten Sam back and somehow he was sharing the bed with her—which wasn't the problem—and Tucker—which was.

He smiled as he sat at the edge of the bed, tugging his own shoes off and sliding in next to Sam, kicking Tucker in the leg gently as he began to snore. There was a grunt from the foot of the bed and Tucker rolled to his side, snores stopping and breathing even in the quiet. Danny snaked an arm out lazily to grab Sam and drag her closer to him, settling her against him before dropping his head to the pillow and closing his eyes.

"You know," he said quietly. "This wasn't exactly how I pictured this."

She laughed quietly, her body shaking against his. "Let me guess. Less Tucker, less clothes, bigger bed?"

"Ah, something like that," he said thickly as he tried not to flush. Then smiled as he buried his face against the nape of her neck, pressing a soft kiss there that sent shivers down her body. "I've never been so relieved in my entire life," he admitted softly, and closed his eyes as her arms wrapped around his where he held her at her waist, fingers firm against his skin.

"Me neither," she whispered. "But I don't want to talk about it now, Danny, please." There was fear in her voice, and nervousness. He could feel it tensing throughout her body, and he held her tighter. "Please, Danny? Can we talk about it after the sun's come up?"

Danny's eyes shifted as he wondered, but he only murmured, "Sure." And then adding as an afterthought, "And when Tucker isn't asleep across the foot of our bed." His words hung in the air but he didn't say anything else, only held on to her as her breathing evened out more and more, his not far behind.

She was very nearly asleep, Tucker's faint snores more reassuring than annoying, when she heard Danny whisper, "I love you, Sam." Sam only smiled and slipped into a dreamless sleep.

xXx

And so it was until much later that morning when Jazz finally went to ask Danny where his houseguest had gone. She'd gotten up earlier than usual and had expected the girl to come down long before Danny, but as the morning wore into midday and midday threatened to become afternoon, Jazz decided that maybe checking on Charlie was in order. But she wasn't there. Her bags were, and her personal items were still scattered through the guest room, but she wasn't.

The worry that followed was spurred more from sisterly protection than actual worry. She knew that Charlie was interested in Danny, and that when Danny could let go of Sam for brief moments he seemed to like the girl. But she knew that it was something that was doomed to never work, because Danny never let go of Sam for very long. Maybe years of therapy would fix that, but she wasn't going to suggest it now, or possibly any time soon. He was still too raw from losing her.

She'd more than half expected to find Charlie and Danny asleep in his bed. It was too quiet for anything else to have been going on. But she hadn't been expecting what she found. Tucker, curled up across the foot of the bed, mouth hanging open, glasses crooked across his face, and blanket rucked up around his shoulders, was nothing new. She'd seen it too many times to do anything more than just snicker a little and wish, not for the first time, that she was cruel enough to take a picture.

And Danny, as she'd expected, huddled underneath his sheet, dark hair barely poking out as his sides rose and fell rhythmically. For once he actually looked like he was sleeping, not even a hint of nightmare to plague him. But next to him… Yes, it was the third figure that bothered her.

She did the only thing a sane person could do when she finds her brother and his best friend in bed with a girl who is supposed to be dead and buried.

She screamed.


	17. Chapter 17

Beneath the Surface 

17

Explanations had been difficult to come by, Jazz's scream rousing the entire neighborhood to see what, exactly, was wrong. And long before the three had managed to sort out a plausible explanation. Resurrection was out, though for several days the local news stations had covered it as a genuine miracle. That had stopped right out when Danny Phantom had showed up and presented them with a gift: a lawsuit on behalf of the Manson's, Sam included, and one Danny Fenton who shared actual credit for her rescue with Tucker.

In fact, the afternoon that Jazz found Sam asleep with Danny and Tucker had actually gone more with garbled sentences from all three as they talked over each other trying to figure it out. But once they had reassured Jazz that Sam wasn't a corpse or a zombie or even a ghost (no matter that if she _were_ a ghost it would be only slightly less weird than Danny being a half ghost) Jazz had managed to curtail her usual streak of nosiness in favor of running her parents out into the hall saying that the Manson's needed to be called, and the police, too.

She's smirked as she left the three to figure out what they could actually say had gone on, knowing that she'd get the truth sooner or later.

They had; the story they worked out was that Sam had been kidnapped by a ghost the night they had broken in to the rec to have their swim. It had a grudge against the Fenton's, and Danny in particular for something he'd helped his parents with before leaving for college, and had decided the best way to get back at him was to take his girlfriend and convince him—and everyone else along with him—that she was dead.

Nobody said a word as the trio labeled Sam as Danny's girlfriend, but there were a few eyebrows raised. Mostly from Sam and Tucker since Danny was the one actually doing the fast talking.

They'd plead ignorance about the body that had been left behind, and true to form Jack Fenton had burst out with a completely insane explanation: it was an ectoplasmic manifestation of the ghost's will. Danny wasn't sure whether he should be pleased or worried that it had been latched on to and accepted so quickly and easily. He settled for relieved, and had continued with the story.

At Sam's insistence they'd worked in yet another character plug for Danny's alter ego, who had come to see Danny Fenton and tell him that the local gossip of the Ghost Zone was the human girl trapped inside. Alive. And once they'd confirmed location and whatnot, Danny and Tucker had gone into the Ghost Zone after her without saying a word to anyone.

"It would have been cruel to give them false hope," Danny had said of the Manson's when explaining it to the police. "We weren't sure it was actually Sam, or that if it was, she was actually alive." He'd shrugged and tossed out his patented clueless smile. "We know Phantom well enough that he wouldn't lead us wrong, but even he wasn't exactly sure."

It had been accepted, hook, line and sinker. And they'd been able to pin Charlie's disappearance on the nameless, faceless, nonexistent ghost, too. Though this time Danny had actually gone to the police as Phantom to tell them he'd found the ghost, taken care of it, and 'learned' that Charlie had apparently been killed or died. Sure, they were wasting time and money dredging Lake Michigan's shoreline for her body, but it was better than them thinking that Danny, Fenton or Phantom, had killed the girl.

And safer never to reveal that she hadn't been human. She was listed as missing and presumed dead, her personal possessions taken by the police well after Sam and Tucker had already picked through them and dismantled the spells and wards the succubus had erected around them. They'd come across a veritable treasure trove of magical supplies and ancient texts that the girl had carted around as a matter of fact.

Sam had been disturbed by the vial of green ectoblood that had been Danny's. But she hadn't said anything. In fact, she'd actually avoided talking about the succubus at all, especially at night, only covering salient points. That she had taken Sam, taunted Sam, and that she was dead now and not ever coming back. She hadn't even asked who had killed Charlie, from either of her friends. Like she was afraid to hear the answer, but already knew it.

Tucker bowed down to Danny's wisdom and never said a thing to Sam about it, and swore that he would never tell her how calm Danny had been about it. _"It wasn't my first time."_ The utter blankness when he'd said that, knowing that it was something best left forgotten.

_"Please don't tell Sam." _

That plea still rang in Tucker's ears, and the naked fear that had streaked across Danny's face before he'd turned away. Danny didn't want her to know, that was good enough for Tucker, and he tried not to wonder. And Sam… She didn't want to know either. A wisdom that went beyond what any of them knew. All the same, Tucker wondered what would happen when Sam realized that Danny wasn't exactly the Danny he'd been. it would come out sooner or later; the day would come when Danny had to kill again if he already had, and more than once, in less than two years.

He crossed his fingers that it wouldn't happen around Sam.

Life had gone back to normal. Or as normal as it ever got for the people who lived in Amity Park. Not that it was ever normal for Danny and his friends. The normalcy they had thought to take refuge in had been shot to pieces by unexpected occurrences. The Manson's taking Danny and Tucker aside and thanking them profusely, offering money, a luxury car or two, and even a brownstone to try and show their appreciation for Sam's rescue. Wisely they two had turned it down. Danny, because he knew that Sam's apparent death actually had been his fault, to an extent. Even if it was only because he was what he was. And Tucker because he knew that Sam's boots would find a permanent home in his shins if he accepted anything.

Neither knew that the Manson's would and did change their will to include the two; their daughter finally taking the topmost pedestal in their hearts. They'd done without her once before—they would never make the mistake of taking Sam for granted again. To Danny and Tucker, that was the best thing they could receive for 'rescuing' her, though it ran very closely, in Danny's mind, to their unmitigated approval of his dating Sam.

The world hadn't paused for even a moment when Jazz had confessed that she wanted to go back to school for the fall semester, some three weeks away. It hadn't even blinked when she also confessed that she and Ryan had eloped when she'd disappeared one sunny afternoon and turned up several days later, husband in tow. The world might have bounced a little when her father had celebrated the fact that she had chosen to hyphenate her last name—a Fenton she was, and a Fenton she would always be.

But the world had ground, metaphorically speaking, to a halt when Sam had decided that she was skipping the fal semester and would return to school in the January, just in time to pick up a spring semester and some summer classes to make up the months she was going to miss. She wanted to spend time with her family, her friends, and have the freedom to do those as much as she wished without fear of slipping grades.

After all, she'd already seen how bleak life could become if she died, and the refused to think of Tucker or Danny dying any time soon. Her well practiced denial slipped easily from her feelings for Danny to the distinct possibility that he would most likely die young, and making it to the age of thirty would be nothing short of a miracle.

She had ten years until that, at least. He'd only just turned twenty that day.

xXx

The day that Danny Fenton turned twenty the sun was shining, and there wasn't a single cloud in sight. The only shadow to the day had been his father hulking over him to wake him well before he actually wanted to get up. Danny had acknowledged, very quietly inside his head as he brushed his teeth, that he was getting spoiled with all of the sleep that summer. School was going to be hell when he went back, an event that was only a week and a half away.

He was trying very hard not to think about it; the thought of leaving Sam was more painful than he wanted to admit, even if she promised to come see him once a month until she had to go back to school herself. And the smile she'd given him when she'd talked about going back to school had been downright evil, an expression that had no place being on her face, and looked far too at home there.

He'd managed to escape the enforced party to join his friends in the park for the afternoon, which was where Sam and Tucker had both found him, half asleep underneath a tree, stretched out with his head cradled on his arms.

"You think he's hibernating?" Sam asked Tucker.

"Not a chance," Tucker said with a sage shake of his head. "I have hibernated many times. This is not hibernating. This is Danny being lazy."

"I've earned it," he mumbled as he cracked his eyes up at his best friends. "You're both late."

Sam flashed him a smile and dropped down next to him, snuggling her head into his shoulder while he shifted to wrap his arm around her. "We had to get your birthday present."

"Just one?" he asked and Sam laughed.

Tucker pulled up some grass next to him and smirked. "I trust you won't mind if I don't play snuggly with you, right?"

"Oh, but Tucker, you know that we share everything with you," Danny drawled as Tucker rolled his eyes.

Sam patted his other arm and grinned as she said, "You're more than welcome to join in."

"Oh god," Tucker muttered. "See, _this_ is why I am the only sane one out of the three of us."

"Oh sure," Danny said as he shifted again, and then sat up. "But sanity is highly overrated. And I've never been sane. So yeah, it's all good. Now," he said as he rubbed his hands together, "I want my present."

Tucker tugged a slim envelope from the pocket of his pants and passed it to Danny, who opened it and raised an eyebrow. "It's a plane ticket. To Amity."

"Well yeah," Tucker said with a smirk. "We have to make sure you come home for the holidays, don't we? And this time, you have to bring Sam jewelry, not a rock. Some nice diamond jewelry."

Both Sam and Danny blushed brightly, though Danny didn't offer to refuse the suggestion. Truth be told, he'd thought about it more than once. He could only thank god that Sam hadn't been there for the hopeless marriage proposal he'd given Charlie when he'd thought she was Sam. He tried to forget it repeatedly, and the burning hope that one day in the not too distant future he'd ask her again. Well, for the first time, and the sheer desperation that he'd get a yes.

"I think," Danny said, carefully avoiding looking at Sam, "that maybe we should date for more than a few weeks before I propose to her."

Tuckers mouth fell open and Danny could practically feel Sam's eyes staring at him like he'd lost his mind, but he only shrugged. "You know, Danny," Tucker offered. "You guys have been practically dating for years already. You have to admit you two were flirting like crazy all through high school."

"Even so," Sam interjected. "We didn't realize it then."

"Right. And 'de Nile' isn't just a river in Egypt."

"Lay off, Tuck," Danny said with a smile and started to fold the envelope back closed, considering the line of conversation finished.

"Wait!" Tuck managed to get out, making Danny stop in his tracks and look around, alarmed.

"That, and there's another ticket behind it," Sam put in.

"What?" Danny plucked the plane ticket from Sacramento out and his jaw fell as he saw what was sitting behind it. A first class ticket to Martinique, in the Barbados Island chain. "You're sending me to a resort?" The shock was loud, and Sam and Tucker laughed.

"Actually, we're all going," Tucker explained.

Sam grinned. "We made all the arrangements, but my parents ponied up the cash." She frowned. "They wanted to send you two anyway. They're being a little too grateful. It's freaking me out."

Danny chuckled. "Too much family time, huh, Sam?"

She muttered something too low for either of them to hear, but it did sound suspiciously like she was cursing ever coming 'back from the dead.' Danny bit back a chuckle and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, letting her sigh and lean into him while Tucker surreptitiously pulled his PDA out to snap another picture, hoping to use for blackmail one day.

He was cut off by a hand phasing the PDA from his and an annoyed Danny saying, "Do you ever get tired of that?"

"Nope," said Tucker happily as Danny dropped the PDA back into his hands without damaging it, or even trying to delete the new pictures.

Instead Danny only shrugged and reached into his pants pocket, pulling out two small black boxes with a faint grin and a devilish gleam to his blue eyes. Tucker chuckled and glanced a suddenly flushed Sam. "Danny, if you're giving me a ring I'm going to maim you. You know that, right?"

Danny shrugged. "Never said it was a ring. Here," he said quietly as he handed the small boxes to his friends, and smiled as they opened them. "We're a team, you know? I figured it was about time you guys had something to show for it. Even if it is a little cheesy."

Tucker whistled as he turned the box over and silver gleamed on his palm. Sam reached into it with slim fingers and hoisted another one. Turned in their hands the silver flashed at them, matching pins with the stylized Danny Phantom logo wrought clean and stark in unchanging metal, brightly gleaming the brilliant sunlight. Tucker smiled widely as Sam turned suddenly shining eyes on Danny, both undoing the clasps and finding places to wear them.

Tucker pinned his very prominently on his red beret, and stood, tilting it at a rakish angle as he chuckled. "Friends first, Danny. Always friends. But the pin is pretty kicking." He shot Danny a raised eyebrow and tossed him a wave before wandering off, his cell phone out and pressed to his ear as he promptly tuned his best friends out.

It was a good thing, Danny realized as he turned to Sam and saw her face looking distinctly watery. "Hey, it's not something to cry over, Sam."

She wavered a smile at him. "Yeah. Who are you and what have you done with my Danny?"

Danny chuckled. "_Your_ Danny?"

"You are the one who called me his girlfriend, remember?" She smiled. "I don't mind."

"Really?" Danny asked surprised, since they'd never actually discussed it. She shook her head.

"But it'd be nice if I'd been asked."

Danny laughed softly and reached over to press a gentle kiss to her cheek. "If that's all it takes to clear it up, Sam? As high school as this sounds, and no laughing," he added with mock severity. "Will you go steady with me?"

"Is this he part where I swoon and profess my undying love for you?"

Danny chuckled. "No, a yes will suffice."

Sam grinned and pinned her Phantom pin to the hem of her skirt, where it would flash at her knees as she walked. "Well, then yes." She leaned over and tugged his face to hers, her hand buried in his dark hair. "And I do love you. Really, I do."

"I love you, too" Danny whispered back as he met her lips with his. "But then," he said wryly as he pulled back. "You knew that already, didn't you?" Sam only smiled as she leaned her head against his shoulder again. "We were coming to save you, you know."

Sam rolled her eyes. "I'm no damsel in distress," she said

"I've noticed."

She heard something underneath the words. Maybe a little wistfulness, or maybe guilt for no having saved her himself. And she could only sigh and shake her head, knowing that his sense of responsibility would poke at him as long as he felt he hadn't done his duty by the people he was supposed to protect. And her most of all. She smiled and leaned back, hands pressing to the warm grass they sat on.

"I'll make you a deal, Danny. If I can save myself, I will." She leaned forward to kiss the dismal look away. "And for the times that I can't, I know you'll be right there."

This time he kissed her, breaking it off as her lips chilled, blue mist rolling from his mouth as he pulled away with a groan. "Their timing," he groaned. "Hold that thought?" Sam nodded and Danny glanced around before shifting to Phantom and launching himself into the air.

Sam sighed and then glanced to her left, startled as Tucked dropped down next to her. "God, Tuck. You scared me."

"You know, one day he's going to do that and someone is going to be looking out their window."

"That's the day we protect him," Sam replied and then pointed to his cell phone. "Miranda?" Tucker nodded, and she chuckled. "So, Tucker, about that golem you made."

"What about it?" he asked, suddenly nervous at her tone.

"Danny told me what a great job you did," and Tucker paled, saying nothing. "How life like its performance was." And now Tucker groaned knowing exactly where she was going. "Tucker. How, exactly, did you know how to please a succubus in bed?"

He choked, rubbed a hand across his face, wiped his glasses off. Cleared his throat and finally just resigned himself to being brick red beneath his dark skin, "All right, what'll it take to keep your silence?"

"The pictures. All of them. In my possession before the day is over."

"Agreed," Tucker said fervently as his eyes tracked the dark dot that streaked across the sky after a paler blue shadow. "Have you two talked about when you go back to NYU?"

Sam shrugged. "No. we don't really need to."

"Oh?" and Tucker raised his brows.

Sam shot a pleased smile at him. "Danny doesn't know, but I'm transferring to UCLA."

Tucker grinned and Sam shot one back. "Lovebirds," Tucker teased gently.

"You'd better believe it," Sam whispered fervently, her amethyst eyes locked on Danny as he flew high above

xXx

_For Nonny, my most faithful reader of this fic, and an amazing writer all on her own._

xXx

**Afterward: **

**I hadn't intended on it ending like this. This isn't to say that the ending isn't as I wanted it; it is and very much so. But I realized, after the fact, that some of the things that happened (beginning with the fight wherein Tucker sees Danny kill without hesitation) were quite curious. And that there was a back story to this, and to Danny's time in ** **California**

**There was never a sequel planned for this. Ever. But I've begun to realize that a _continuation_ might be in order. **

**It will be some time in coming, I've many other projects I'd like to work on before jumping back into the particular universe, but I'm not leaving it for good. I like the self sufficient trio I've put together. I like Tucker and his technomancy, and Sam and her adoration of playing with leylines if only to irritate Tucker. (I still wonder myself what incident led to Tucker's dislike of leylines…) And I think I'm completely on with the idea of Danny as a ruthless person, if he had to be. **

**I've no idea myself why this is, but I aim to find out. If only for me and the few faithful readers I've had. So lastly, I'd like to extend a heartfelt thank you and all my love to the people who've read and reviewed. This story may not have gotten the response I wanted it to, but for once in my fic writing career, I can say that I wrote this without the intentions of actually pleasing the readers. **

**I pleased myself. This was for me, to prove that I could. **

**I did, and thank you to Call Me Blue Streak, dragon-game, ThunderDragon, MxMrc, Me The Anon One, RiannonGrey, Annabelle Carter, Very Pissed!, Leppers, Raven of the Night676, DAFA The Que's October Sky, TDG3RD , CharmedNightSkye, b4k4 ch4n, Snea, challengeAUTHORITY, Girl in Blue and StrugglingArtist for coming along for the ride. And for those who come along after the fat, I hope you enjoyed it too. **

**Until next time. **

**Chaos Dragon **


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